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Looking for a spark: Lakeside man, Jerry Meerkatz named CEO of Canadian technology company Infowave Software
Today as Jerry Meerkatz begins his first day as chief executive officer of Infowave Software, http://www.infowave.com/ he starts the week as he will those to come — with a plane ride.
By Camden Easterling
The Daily Inter Lake
Each week, Meerkatz, 45, will commute from his home in Lakeside to the company’s office in Vancouver, B.C.
Although he temporarily leaves his wife and two children behind, he knows that a spark, a burst of enthusiasm, lies ahead.
Meerkatz anticipates that plenty of exciting hurdles, both personal and professional, will accompany this career move.
Infowave, a company that specializes in wireless software technology, named Meerkatz CEO earlier this year. He will head the public company while he balances work, family and the requisite commute.
"The real spark that got me to Infowave … is the opportunity to do something different," he said.
Infowave will be Meerkatz’s first time working as a CEO, but after spending more than 20 years in the field, he is hardly new to the technology business.
After graduating from Flathead High School in 1976, Meerkatz went to DeVry University in Arizona where he studied engineering.
There was a time, though, when he considered forgoing college for a career at the aluminum plant in Columbia Falls.
Meerkatz worked at the plant the summer after he graduated from high school. At the time his hourly wage of $8.25 was more money than he had made at any of his after-school jobs at local gas stations in Kalispell. The money seemed good and college seemed unnecessary, Meerkatz recalls.
But a fellow worker asked him about his plans, and he explained his dilemma. An older coworker encouraged him to rethink skipping college.
"He instilled in me that spark that you can’t settle, you got to go to school," Meerkatz said, gesturing with his hands in what seems to be his typical animated, enthusiastic manner.
After completing his degree at DeVry, Meerkatz began his career at ITT Courier/Servcom in Phoenix.
He worked as an engineer for several years, but eventually he noticed that the job was lacking the kind of pizzazz he needed.
The realization became clear one day when Meerkatz talked with coworkers about their weekend plans. His friends’ activities centered around science and engineering.
"I said, ‘You know what, I’m with the wrong group,’" Meerkatz remembers. "That was actually the spark that led me into marketing."
Engineering was an interesting job, and one that he was good at, but Meerkatz didn’t see it as something he wanted to pursue on the weekends.
"To be great at anything, you just have to view it as something you’d be willing to make a hobby," he explained.
By 1985, Meerkatz had switched from designing technology products to marketing them.
He created and handled contracts for the marketing end of ITT. Meerkatz found his engineering background helped him work with both engineers and marketing people.
"That thrilled me to be that catalyst and communication link," he said.
The career switch not only brought him a renewed interest in his job, but it also meant meeting his future wife. Tori worked in marketing at ITT when the couple met in 1986. They married in 1988, the same year Meerkatz resigned from ITT and went to work for Compaq.
The couple moved to Texas to be near Compaq’s Houston office. During his 14-year tenure with Compaq, Meerkatz continued to work in marketing. One of his projects was creating the sub-brand iPaq, which included products such as handheld PCs.
While in Texas, he and his wife had their two children, Sarah, now 14, and Jake, now 10.
But his job at Compaq required handling business abroad, so Meerkatz often was away from his family.
In May 2002, Compaq merged with Hewlett-Packard, meaning Meerkatz was not only working with a new company, but also dealing with a new travel route.
The company has an office in Palo Alto, Calif., so Meerkatz begin staying out west several days a week while his family stayed in Texas. The schedule was not ideal, but Meerkatz said it was preferable to uprooting the family.
"It’s not really that complicated, it just means a lot of travel," he said.
Meerkatz had a contract with HP that lasted for a year after the merger, so Meerkatz and his wife knew they needed to think about where to settle.
The family decided that even if Meerkatz continued with HP, California wasn’t the right place for them due to high cost of living, safety concerns and other factors. So Meerkatz could either continue commuting from Texas or the family could relocate elsewhere.
"Nothing grounded us in Texas," he said.
Montana seemed like the logical choice.
The family has owned its current Lakeside home since 1988 and used it as a vacation house. And Meerkatz’s parents, Bob and Fran, still live in the valley. Meerkatz and his wife decided Lakeside would make a good home base if he was going to continue commuting.
Tori Meerkatz and the children moved to the valley in July 2002. Jerry Meerkatz continued to bounce between Texas, Montana and California for several months until he settled in Lakeside.
"I’m well-versed on the commuting kind of schedule," he said.
In January 2003, though, traveling to California began to take its toll.
"The commuting wasn’t bad, but it was worse than I would want to do on a regular basis," he said.
Meerkatz began to look for something new to pursue when his HP contract expired — but he wanted to make sure he found something that sparked his interest.
Meerkatz joined the Infowave board in June 2003. He had worked with Infowave several years before and was friends with the board’s chairman.
When board members were hunting for a new CEO, they offered Meerkatz the position. He knew finding a similar job in the valley was unlikely, so he and his family were prepared for another commuting schedule.
Meerkatz and his wife also wanted the children to stay close to his parents and continue their schooling at Flathead Valley Christian.
"That was worth not changing right there," he said.
But the spark that Infowave offered seemed to outweigh the hectic travel requirements.
He is excited to take his first position as CEO with a company that already is publicly traded. While some CEOs might shy away from that kind of pressure, Meerkatz said he is thrilled by the challenges.
He looks forward to watching Infowave grow and defining a clear vision and management style for the small company of about 50 people.
Meerkatz already has been traveling to Vancouver periodically, but this week he will begin his regular commuting schedule. He plans to spend three weekdays in Vancouver and three days at home on the weekends — the hours spent traveling will constitute the seventh day of each week.
But Meerkatz also will have to reserve time for working on the book he is co-authoring with a colleague. The book, due to be published by McGraw-Hill next year, will focus on management issues and business modeling.
Meerkatz’s many commitments will keep him on the go, but he is confident his strong work ethic will enable him to keep his juggling act going.
And he and his wife already have determined that the schedule leaves at least the weekends open for being together. During the week, the family is busy with activities and schoolwork, so the weekends are the main opportunity for family togetherness, they said.
They plan to apply the "quality, not quantity" adage to their time together with activities such as outdoor sports and family meals.
Meerkatz and his wife know the commute will take some adjustment, but they are confident that they can balance time together and time apart.
"It works for us," Tori Meerkatz said.
Reporter Camden Easterling may be reached at 755-7000 or by e-mail at [email protected]
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