In the fall of 2003 Scott Knorp (then 39) suffered a sudden, massive mid life crisis. Nobody close to him saw it coming. He and his wife of fifteen years, Karin, were comfortably settled in the upscale Seattle suburbs with their three daughters. He was in his 11th year as Executive Vice President of a global video conferencing integrator that had gone from 5M to more than 50M under his watch. Though he had recently changed his beloved hairstyle of the last 39 years, the warning sign went unnoticed. Shortly thereafter he began to dab a bit of gel in the front - perhaps in an attempt to give his hair shape. Or was it a cry for help?

Meanwhile, 800 miles to the south, Ken Apperson (also 39) had just relocated his family from their beach house on Oahu to northern California for his wife Michelle's residency program at UC Davis medical center. As a sales rep for the largest Avaya partner in the U.S. he was a month shy of his 7th consecutive year as the company's top producer. With sales no longer offering the personal challenge it once had, Ken began to spend an inordinate amount of time in front of the mirror shadowboxing to the Rocky 2 soundtrack. And it was during this trying period that Scott called.

At approximately 11:30AM on the morning of October 25th 2003, Ken's cell phone rang. "I was at Wal-Mart buying tennis balls,” recounts Ken. "And I think a jumbo bag of dog bisquits."  The voice on the other line was equal parts loud and pathological.  "KENNETH, WE'RE GOING TO QUIT OUR JOBS AND START A COMPANY!!!!!” Scott announced to Ken and several of his fellow Wal-Mart shoppers in the vicinity. "He sounded so excited - I just didn't have the heart to say no," remembers Ken. "In hindsight, I probably didn't think it through enough."

The idea was simple. Ken knew voice, Scott knew video. With the convergence revolution looming, it was apparent to them that voice and video would soon reside on a single IP network. The new company would sell both applications under a single roof. Quagga had been born.

In the spirit of full disclosure it must be noted that neither Ken nor Scott are what you might call "intelligent." While their IQ's aren't necessarily in the lowest percentile, it was clear that Quagga was never going to thrive on their brainpower alone. The amazing thing that happened early on was the company's ability to attract world class talent. "I think people felt sorry for us - maybe because of the company name we chose, I'm not really sure," Scott stated. "But then a buzz was created and suddenly we were hiring some of the best engineers and salespeople in the industry." Make no mistake: the people of Quagga are what have fueled the company's meteoric growth. And while our culture is fun and more than a little irreverent, there is a passion for the customer here that is absolutely unique.

Quagga - not yet 6 years old - is now the largest Avaya partner in the western region and a leading integrator of Polycom, Lifesize and Tandberg video collaboration applications. Our 150,000 IP voice and video endpoints deployed globally are the most of any value added reseller in the country. With sales offices in NJ, TX, AZ, MO, NV and sites throughout California, the name Quagga - along with being hard to pronounce - has become synonymous with world class voice and video system integration.

From the flicker of a misfired synapse in Scott Knorp's brain to our status today as a marquis national integrator with customers such as eBay, Pixar, Safeway, Cigna, Blue Shield and Fox Entertainment - the Quagga story is only just beginning to unfold.