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Brothers run 'innovation factors'
If James Bond were to move operations to Loudoun County, he would probably turn to Joe and Italo Travez to replenish his assortment of high-tech gadgetry.The brothers head up Prototype Productions Inc., an Ashburn-based company that designs and manufacturers just about anything a client can dream up. “From Concept to Commercialization” is the company's motto.
Creations by PPI designers, engineers and fabricators run the gamut from a self-guided parachute that eases cargo to the ground to a digital training tool that allows surgeons to train in a simulated operating room.
“We're an innovation factory,” said Joe, 47, the company's chief executive officer and an architect by training.
Italo, 41, founded the company in Gaithersburg in 1991 soon after returning from racing a solar-powered car across Australia's outback. His desire then, as it is now, was to marry the art and science of technology under one roof.
“We want everyone involved in the company -- from branding to engineering,” said Italo, an engineer and PPI's chief operations officer.
One example of the benefit of having scientists work alongside designers, according to Italo, is that an engineer may briefly look beyond the functionality of a device and also see it for its aesthetic value.
“If I make this red,” he imagined an engineering saying, “it may sell.”
After a 15-year stint as a hotel designer with Marriott, Joe joined the company in 1998. A few years later, the brothers, of Ecuadorian descent, moved PPI's headquarters to Loudoun.
Today, the company occupies about 35,000 square feet of space in the Beaumeade office park in Ashburn and another 15,000 square feet in Rockville, Md., and employs 75 workers.
Its biggest clients are in health care and homeland defense, including General Dynamics and the U.S. Army. Since 1998, the company has developed 120 products.
And although the brothers would say the opinion of their clients comes first, recognition from elsewhere continues to pour in.
In 2007, the Virginia Chamber of Commerce named PPI as one of its “Fantastic 50” companies. Last year, PPI made Deloitte's list of fastest growing technology companies in Virginia by expanding revenues 354 percent between 2003 and 2007. The latest honor came in January when DiversityBusiness.com named PPI as one of the top 500 Hispanic-American owned companies in the nation.
This latest honor is particularly dear to the brothers, who still look to the example of hard work and dedication set by their immigrant father, Jose Travez, who, at 73, also works at PPI.
“It's significant,” Joe said, “only in that Hispanic youth might look to us as an example for getting involved in technology.”
Contact the reporter at jjacks@timespapers.com
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