Success Stories

Life in the Big Easy has improved greatly for Marseyas S. Fernandez. His integrated digital solutions company, MSF Global Solutions, survived Hurricane Katrina and is rapidly growing to move beyond a regional focus to a global one.

A native of New Orleans, Fernandez is the founder of the company which specializes in Geospatial Information Services (GIS) and Information Technology development, implementation and management.

Started in 2003, MSF Global was established to provide local governments, universities, businesses, and charities with cost effective GIS and related IT services. Since its inception, the company has used GIS as a key technology in land records management, infrastructure management and economic/community development.

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American Steel Placers Assisted by MBDA California NABEC

As a second generation owner of a steel company, some might say that entrepreneurship flows through Russell E. Robertson’s blood. His company, American Steel Placers, Inc. is located in San Bernardino, CA and has contracts with city, county and state agencies to supply and place rebar (reinforcement steel) for concrete structures.

Created in 2004, American Steel Placers specializes in bridge construction, community public works and commercial buildings.

As a child, he watched his mother’s strength raising four children alone and managing the company she worked for in the male-dominated steel industry. By the time Robertson was 14 years old, his mother had bought out the stock to become majority owner at Puget Sound Steel after the owner died. She operated the company for 12 years in Seattle, where Robertson worked in the evenings after school for four years. He later moved to Los Angeles continuing in the steel business building bridges.

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For Mariana Oprea failure is not an option. After being laid off due to company restructuring, she founded Interavia Spares & Services (ISS) Inc. in 2003 building on what she knows best – selling aircraft parts.

Her company is a distributor and reseller of aviation parts and materials to an international market of airlines, repair stations and other brokers abroad, with 95 percent of her business in exports. As an international supplier, she communicates in six languages: English, Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese and Romanian.

“I organized it, and built it up based on my previous experience in sales and after models of companies I wanted to emulate,” Oprea said. “I had to create everything myself and sustain myself along these years.”

Oprea started her career in aviation parts working for British Aerospace in 1981 as a contract administrator for Project BAC-111 aircraft built in Romania until 1989. In the U.S., she has worked in the sales of aircraft parts since 1994.