Globecomm chief always looking for growth

There is always something new at Globecomm Systems Inc., the manufacturer of satellite-based communications systems.

The Hauppauge-based company is now in the maritime business. Globecomm has communications equipment on some 2,200 merchant ships. This came about through an acquisition last year of two companies - Telaurus Communications of New Jersey and Mach6 of the Netherlands, both of which provided satellite services to ships at sea.

The new market is Globecomm's fifth. The company was already in wireless, government, media and enterprise areas.

So maybe the latest move should round off a career for David Hershberg, Globecomm's chief executive and chairman, who founded the company in 1994 and saw revenues rise to about $170 million. After all, Hershberg celebrated his 73rd birthday May 31. But Hershberg said retirement is not in his plans.

"My dad worked until he was about 97," Hershberg said in an interview last week. "I'm going to stick it out until the stock gets higher."

Globecomm's stock seems frozen in the $7 to $8 range - shares closed at $7.54 yesterday, up four cents - despite 25 consecutive quarters of profitability, the company's numerous government and private contracts and the deal it has with cable TV's Showtime Networks, which it distributes. Hershberg has grown the company to about 390 employees, some 220 of them on Long Island.

There is a planning meeting next month. Hershberg said maybe the time is right for Globecomm to concentrate on areas it is already in.

Was the company then going to stand still for now?

"I don't know yet," Hershberg said. In other words, don't count on it.