ELYRIA — A downtown Elyria business got a huge boost recently when NASA awarded it a contract that could reach $40 million.

Information Dynamics, a management and technology consulting firm that helps to coordinate business objectives with information technology solutions, beat out a group of larger competitors to secure the contract, which could hit $40 million if all its options are exercised over the next five years.

Bob Stauffer co-founded the company with his wife, Sharon, in 1995, and said the company’s previous experience with NASA helped secure the bid.

“We’ve been in business for 14 years and have been working with the (business side of) NASA for all of those 14 years,” he said. “Our relationships with all the NASA centers around the country gave us the insight to win this.”

Information Dynamics specializes in enterprise architecture and will help to make sure that the money, people, processes and technologies are all in order to enable NASA’s forthcoming missions.

Stauffer said that although the company has been awarded plenty of contracts in the past to be proud of, the $40 million NASA contract is by far the largest for the company.

“This is 10 times larger than anything we’ve ever won before,” Stauffer said. “It puts us on the map, and now we know we can compete with larger companies for larger contracts.”

In the late 1990s, Stauffer served as a strategic consultant for a large consulting firm before choosing to leave so that he could better serve his customers as an independent contractor, he said.

The couple — who live in Spencer — share duties at the office; Sharon Stauffer is owner, and Bob Stauffer is president.

Information Dynamics is based in downtown Elyria and also has offices in Washington, D.C., California and South Dakota.

The company’s revenue will exceed $3 million this year and is looking to add to its total of 19 employees soon.

Stauffer said he intends for the company to bring Elyria along for the ride.

“This contract should provide us with 100 percent growth in the coming years,” he said. “We’ve made a commitment to being here in Elyria. We’d like to improve conditions here by attracting better, high-paying jobs. We like Elyria, it’s not much deeper than that — we’d like to be a part of making Elyria a better place.”

Contact Stephen Szucs at 329-7129 or sszucs@chroniclet.com.

 

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