The IT and managed services firm cb20 purchased Suite 101 at 268 Broadway, just south of Congress Park, and moved in at the end of April.
According to CEO and president Chris Pickett, this 30-year-old company was rebranded in 2020 when he acquired it, fueling its growth and the need for larger spaces for employees and clients.
Five years ago when Pickett and his co-owners moved the business, then named Computer Professionals International, from Schenectady to Federal Street in Saratoga, there were 20 on staff. This year the count will surpass 100, he said.
Moreover, while the average IT competitor has an average growth rate of five or six percent annually in terms of gross revenue, Pickett said cb20 is growing well over 50 percent a year.
Purchasing both their office and warehouse spaces was central to the company’s “plan for a more permanent solution,” said Pickett.
“We have a commitment to long-term growth, and owning rather than leasing properties means we are here to stay,” he said.
Continuum Commercial Realty was the buyer’s representative on the purchase of the warehouse on 9 Old Stonebreak Road in Malta this January, said Pickett.
cb20 is a technology firm that has responded to the needs of businesses for more cloud based services, which is reflected in its name change in 2020. It is “a ‘people first culture,’ because in the IT and audio visual industry, the people make it happen every day,” Pickett said.
“The service of our people is the foundation of our being able to acquire new customers and take market share from our competition to drive our growth,” he said.
Customers are one of two different types and both are growing. There is a group of large Fortune 500 companies for whom the company does specific things that its internal IT department does not. The other is the group of Capital Region companies who outsource all IT services to cb20.
Technology and the ways businesses use technology are in constant change, and Pickett said that delivering services “that are different from what customers were receiving allows the company to compete and grow.”
“Like everybody, we use technology for communication, as well as to support the remote hybrid workplace we have,” he said.
“We’re also using all our tools to support ourselves and protect ourselves from all the cybersecurity risks out there, which everybody should be worrying about because they are real,” he said. “And we do the same for our customers through the work we do every day.”
In 2024, cb20 began investing in the New England market, and now plans to have a satellite office in the Boston area sometime during the second half of this year, he said.
Pickett said they are always recruiting staff to support both the Saratoga and Boston-based offices. The firm won a Best Place To Work designation from Albany Business Review every year from 2019 through 2024 and a Top Place To Work award from Times Union from 2021 through 2025.
“cb20 has a tagline, ‘An Experience Above,’ and that’s what we are trying to make this place for our customers, our employees, and for the community where we serve and live,” he said.
“We want to be different and be a place people are proud to work at,” he said. “In the culture we have created, we listen to them and they are not afraid to speak their ideas. They will be heard.”
Pickett also said the firm “tries to do what we say we are going to do every single day,”
Learn more at cb20.com.