When our founder and president, Joe Baumoel, received Ernst & Young's "Entrepreneur of the Year" award recently, he chose not to describe our company抯 longevity in terms of its many years of operation. "We've lived through eight recessions," observed Joe instead. "In that time, we've watched many businesses - competitors and friends alike - come and go. One of the main reasons we survived is because we began with a clear philosophy, not just a product."

    Developing products that can serve more than one industry has been the driving force for success throughout our history. Today, our company is one of the world's largest suppliers of instruments, which measure and control the processing of liquids. Our products can be found in petroleum pipelines from Alaska to Saudi Arabia ... from Anheuser Busch's beer vats to Proctor & Gamble's peanut butter processing plants ... from wastewater treatment plants in the United States to potable water lines in China卆nd from chilled water pipes in the World Trade Center to ballast control systems in the US Navy's fleet of Trident submarines.

    "One of the main reasons I left military electronics to start my own business was that I saw how economically vulnerable companies became when they relied on a single industry," said Baumoel. "I decided right from the start that manufacturing a ubiquitous product - one that could be put to a wide variety of uses - was the best way to avoid being at the mercy of one industry's fortunes. Liquid flow control fit that description perfectly, because most industries need to be able to accurately monitor liquid flow and detect leaks."

    Joe's philosophy has proven itself year after year. Our standard line of flow control devices serve 13 different industries and a wide range of applications, including petroleum pipelines, water and wastewater treatment facilities, heating and cooling systems, fossil fuel and nuclear power facilities, chemical processing, aircraft hydraulics, food processing, semiconductor and automotive. The company does not, as a rule, involve itself in contract work, but we occasionally adapt our line of standard measurement instruments to the needs of specific industries.

    "Our business combines physics, electronics, computer science, mechanical design and, most importantly, what I call 'adaptive thinking,'" notes Joe. "One of the reasons we have been successful is that we encourage everybody in the company to think like entrepreneurs. When our engineers design a new product, somebody is always working to find new applications where it might be useful beyond what it was originally designed for."

    Right From the Start...Like many electronics entrepreneurs, Joe's success story began in his garage. With a background in the aerospace industry - specifically in military electronics - he saw that most process control instruments were woefully unsophisticated. His first efforts were in the development of electronic liquid level sensors, a more accurate alternative to the mechanical floats that were most often employed in the early 1960s. Armed with a handful of spec sheets and driving ambition, Baumoel acted as his own sales representative and adapted one of his commercial products for use by Republic Aircraft. As a result, the Controlotron fuel vent detector, an electronic device that alerted fighter pilots to the potentially hazardous presence of fuel in an aircraft's venting system, became standard equipment in all Air Force F-105 fighter jets. Bolstered by that steady income flow, Joe consciously turned toward more commercial markets, bringing Controlotron products into a variety of liquid control applications.

    In 1969, Joe recognized the potential impact of computers on process control. He also realized that Controlotron was unable at that point to take advantage of that potential, because the company had no practical experience in computer design and operation. To gain the knowledge we would need, Joe turned to one of his personal passions, golf. "As any golfer knows, the process of determining handicaps is extremely complex and time consuming," said Joe. "Fortunately, that is exactly the sort of job a computer handles best."

    In 1971, after two years of research and development, Controlotron introduced the world's first golf handicap computer - and the reaction was beyond anyone's expectations. Joe found himself as a guest on The Today Show, as well as numerous other programs, and the computer, which was made available as a rental to more than 10,000 country clubs, began to provide a substantial source of income.

    That income, and the computer knowledge gained, was immediately reinvested in the development of a new breed of flow control devices, the world's first units able to monitor liquids and detect leaks without physically cutting into existing pipelines. Eventually, Controlotron became internationally known for two different types of "clamp-on" units. Both use ultrasonic energy to provide a "view" into a pipeline, but one utilizes transit-time technology, while the other employs Doppler spectral analysis. The distinct technologies involved ensure that there is a Controlotron product to suit nearly any need in liquid processing, from leak detection to chemical additive control.

    Controlotron's flowmeters are now used by hundreds of major companies here and abroad. In fact, our leak detection systems are the only electronic systems approved for use in Germany. Our international business, which began in 1975, has since grown to nearly half of our annual sales. To speed and guide international sales growth, we have established offices or subsidiaries in Europe, Japan and Mexico.

    A Look Ahead...Despite an ever-widening range of uses for our products, our engineers are not resting on their laurels. Our latest generation of flowmeters (System 1010) offer smaller, lighter packages with increased functionality and even more efficient performance.

    "Our mission hasn't changed," says Joe. "We will continue to provide valuable information and solutions to our customers' problems in various industries. In many ways, we are in the ideal business to achieve continued growth. Every place liquids are used - and if you factor in heating and cooling, drinking water and wastewater, that's almost everywhere - is a potential market for our products."