Is this thing on?

Wow.

I am truly blown away by the response from you all; as of writing this over 280 subscribers. I have loved getting to know everyone of the past year in the industry; creating friendships and partnerships in the time between.

I wanted to start this off with a dive into who I am, where I am from, and where I plan on going. It may get pretty personal; don't expect me to apologize for it.

First off; O-H

Born and raised in the amazing Buckeye state.

It all started one July 28th night in 1987; there was a massive winter storm (ok maybe not)

Fast forward through my boring life-high school graduation; I left college in 2006 and dove right into the energy industry. My plan growing up was ALWAYS to work for my dad and eventually take over the family business. My dad started in energy deregulation; most would actually call him the pioneer of it.

I remember the first day on the job, my now Directory of Business Development; Keith Madden, threw a stack of renewals on my desk with one marching order: call them.

It was trial by fire. I got a few decent accounts under my wing through this. I learned; and I learned fast.

Fast forward a few years and the 2008 market crash happened. To say that the next year or so was stressful would be an understatement. It's funny looking back at it now years removed; I didn't realize how bad things were.

But my pops and "The A Team" rolled up their sleeves and spent some sleepless nights (some even sleeping at the office). I didn't have much drive for a good 8-10 years of my adult life; I was there for a paycheck. I quickly learned I HATED energy. It wasn't fun, the people were unwelcoming, and my personality didn't fit.

2009 caused us to "rethink" how we viewed what a "commodity" was.

We thought: "Gas to heat, Electric to keep the lights on, and telephones to keep the business profitable." We moved into #telco. Over the next several years I slowly was introduced into an industry I was seething at the mouth to jump into.

2014 came and pulled me away even further.

Remember that horrible polar vortex in 2014? Guess what? It hurt the energy industry; who would have thought? Now came the layoffs. This is when the depression started. I was on cruise control for about 4 years until more volatile market conditions would cause me personally to have to lay off staff. This is when the anxiety took over; add in a dash of a comedy with a year of a monthly (sometimes weekly) recurrence of murphy's law in motion.

I worked in energy from 2006-2022 (overlapping careers; stick with me)

My Volli path started around 2015 when we launched our first rudimentary #ucaas app. Zero customers, all programming and product, no sales. Living the dream.

Things really started to heat up for us in 2019 right before COVID; and then once COVID hit, everyone switched to being remote.

We were thick in development of our own new platform while also providing all the backend support for FORTINET's #FortiVoice product as their exclusive #SIPTrunk provider. This is where I thrived.

As one employment was ending; another was #thriving.

It hasn't been without its own issues. Not many relatively healthy men can boast a heart attack by the age of 34.

"So I got that goin' for me, which is nice."

We are developing some amazing ground breaking technologies in the #siptrunking industry. A massive value add for anyone juggling multiple products AND their own #siptrunks; and an enormous gap fill for anyone using our competitors (sorry not sorry).

Tell me what they are offering, and Volli will crush it.

We hit our first large expo November 2021; and the rest is history.

(or will be another topic for another newsletter)

#sip #siptrunking #sipissexy #siphappens #securesip #volli #fortinet #securityfabric #fabricconnector #sbc #e911