Construction and security

SERVICE
Axis Global Enterprises, Virginia Beach
axisge.com

Ross Vierra has an eye for opportunity.

The former Naval officer bought a Virginia Beach-based construction company in 2011 and added a Newport News-based security services firm three years later.

From 2012 to 2015, revenue at the combined company, Axis Global Enterprises, grew 1,274 percent, making it the third-fastest-growing company on the Fantastic 50 and the top service firm on the list.

One of the company’s newest security services is “active-shooter” detection.

“The sensory system can be placed throughout a building, and you can track where the shooter takes a shot,” says Vierra, the firm’s CEO and president. “It will give you real-time information, which can be given to emergency personnel, the police or the facility. You can see where the last shot was fired.”

Combined with a security system, the active-shooter service can lock down “different areas [of a building] in real time. Access-control cameras can be integrated as well,” Vierra adds. “It’s a sad thing that we had to go to this technology, but that is the world we live in.”

The security services branch of the company also provides physical security, video cameras, access control, videophone verification and fire alarms. Vierra entered the security services market with his purchase of ASI Security in Newport News.

“We have jobs on the security side of the business all over the U.S.,” Vierra says. “We are now installing under-vehicle detection systems for the U.S. Mint all over the country.”

His construction division, founded in 2009, originally was called Axis Road Markings. “We are a design/build general contractor, and we work with a lot of government facilities as well as other clients,” Vierra says. “We do everything from renovation to new construction.”

In addition to its Virginia Beach and Newport News offices, the company has an office in the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

Both of the company’s divisions are in growth mode with projects evenly divided between construction and security.

“We are seeing tremendous growth on the commercial side of our construction business,” Vierra says. “We are going into 2017 and 2018 and also seeing growth in government projects that have been tabled for so long.”

Vierra is hiring employees to prepare for that growth. “We make sure we have the best people engaged and ready to perform,” he says. “Without the team, we wouldn’t be where we are.”