Steve Nichols
It's not often you get to meet a true entrepreneur, but if anyone deserves the title, Fred Sontag, president of Unison does.
His company is the number one manufacturer of electrical devices for aero engines, with sales of more than $150 million. But it's how the company started up that's the real story.
"I had been fired from my previous job and was unemployed when the opportunity came about to buy what was to become Unison," he says.
"It had annual sales of $8 million when I bought it, but the market for small piston-engined aeroplanes crashed just after I signed the deal. We went from 225 employees down to 65 and I had $8 million worth of debt which I had to personally guarantee.
Niche market
"We had to do something, so we concentrated on our niche market. Slowly we grew, from a 30% market share to 70% by 1986," Sontag says.
With the piston-engined market unlikely to recover, the company started to develop igniters for gas turbine engines. Unison was the first company to produce a solid-state igniter and launched it at Farnborough in 1988.
Then the Bendix ignition systems division of AlliedSignal came up for sale. Unison bought it in 1989 and Sontag found himself back in debt.
"It was the same thing again, only more zeros this time!" he says.
Sontag turned the company around, picked up sales from the competition, paid off the debt and got itchy feet again.
This time it was for the Engine Electrical Systems division of BF Goodrich, which Unison bought in 1996.
Now the company produces ignition systems, alternators, sensors and wiring harnesses for gas turbine engines and ignition systems for light piston-engined aircraft too.
Claims
Sontag proudly claims that his company's products can be found on "virtually every aircraft built in the free world".
The company also produces igniters for the Space Shuttle's main engines and other NASA rocket motors.
Based in Jacksonville, Florida, Unison has three other plants in New York, Texas and Illinois, employing 1,150 people.
The company (Hall 4, Stand B20) is making three announcements at the show. The first is the launch of a new system that can "throw" the spark further into the turbine engine, so making starting easier.
The second is for a new Service Express programme that promises to overhaul and repair engine harnesses within four days.
Last, but not least, is the company's EpiC engine control system, which can enhance the life of a piston engine and improve its economy.
As Sontag admits: "Back in 1989 we couldn't have dreamed that we would grow as big as we are now. But If you wanna be an entrepreneur, you gotta start somewhere."
Source: Flight Daily News
