LEADERS
COVER story KIM WHITTAKER, PRESIDENT, FNTS.
Silicon Prairie Player
KIM WHITTAKER WANTS MORE WOMEN IN TECH First National Technology Solutions (FNTS) president Kim Whittaker is a Silicon Prairie player. A subsidiary of First National of Nebraska, FNTS is a managed IT services provider for hundreds of clients. Locally, it earned the Greater Omaha Chamber Business Excellence Award for Leadership. Nationally, it’s been named a Rising Star by tech research and advisory influencer ISG (Information Services Group). Whittaker joined FNTS, a then-startup, in 1996. She worked in finance, then sales, before managing the entire sales team.
New client growth last year drove the onboarding of two dozen new employees, increasing the FNTS payroll to 130. Most employees work at the company’s 201 N. 16th St. headquarters. The north downtown campus includes one of two FNTS data centers. The second is in Lyle, Illinois. Whittaker anticipates more employee growth to follow the expected new client growth. “We’re also investing, like everyone else, in automation and tools. Where we can gain greater efficiencies by leveraging tools, we’ll do that,” she said.
Notable gains
Setting FNTS apart
She assumed the presidency in 2017, becoming FNTS’s first female president. The company has experienced robust growth since then. “Our revenues have doubled over the past five years,” Whittaker said. She said the company recently launched a five-year plan and expects to double again, averaging 20% annual growth. FNTS works nationwide, counting Fortune 100 organizations among its customers. “We work with clients across all industries,” she said. “For most, we support their most critical applications. “A lot of our clients are in heavily regulated industries. So we have a very strong security posture that helps differentiate us. Probably 45% of our business is within financial services or insurance. We do quite a bit with the public sector (including state and local government clients), health care, manufacturing, transportation-logistics, retail.”
FNTS struggled early on in building name recognition and brand awareness in the competitive, fluid, and West Coast prevalent IT industry. It’s since made significant strides in increasing visibility. “We’ve really invested a lot the last five to eight years from a marketing perspective,” Whittaker said. “Building partnerships with name IT brands has helped in getting our name out there. We’ve got extensive relationships now with the biggest players in this space — IBM, Microsoft, Dell-EMC, Ensensor.” Whittaker leverages FNTS’s Midwest roots. “That Midwest work ethic and culture really shine through with our delivery and how much our people care about that end result,” she said.
Customizable solutions
Greater efficiencies and cost savings are two value-adds FNTS prides itself on.
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