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Of course we have a story. Every interesting organization does!

Clifford R. Kurtzman, Ph.D. (Photo by Jordan Chan.)

The story of ADASTRO and its founder, Dr. Cliff Kurtzman, are deeply intertwined. Cliff's experience has ranged from working as an astronautical engineer (yes, he really has worked as a rocket scientist!) to being one of the first to leverage the power of the Internet to build profitable branded communities with global impact. Over the past fifteen years, Cliff has been involved in creating and building a wide variety of business ventures, bringing a unique combination of skills together as an entrepreneur, technologist, and marketer. Through these activities, Cliff developed a network of associates and colleagues who were truly the "best of the best" in a broad spectrum of change management, marketing, venture development and corporate advancement disciplines. In late 2002, Cliff started thinking about how he could focus this reservoir of talent to tackle significant corporate value enhancement projects that would benefit from the skills of a rocket scientist and his team. Under the auspices of the Starhold Corporation, ADASTRO was launched in early 2003 to meet this objective. The market has embraced the concept, and ADASTRO has been profitable since its inception.

But to truly understand the story behind ADASTRO, one really needs to look back long before its actual founding in January 2003. Perhaps it is fitting to go back to July 20, 1969, when Cliff was nine years old, and Neil Armstrong took his first steps on the moon. Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” gave Cliff a sense of vision that has since guided his career towards opening up new frontiers. Cliff went on to earn a Bachelor of Science degree (1981), summa cum laude, in Aerospace Engineering from the University of California at Los Angeles, and his Master of Science (1984) and Doctor of Philosophy (1988) degrees in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This was followed by six years in Houston at Space Industries International, Inc., an entrepreneurial start-up focused on decreasing the costs and increasing the commercial potential of working in space. Cliff supported a variety of both technical and business development roles at the company, working on several commercial spacecraft programs and acting as one of the lead developers for an innovative spacecraft mission control center (shown in the photo above). During the time that Cliff was involved with the company, Space Industries expanded from 33 to 2700 people through growth and merger.

Cliff’s less-than-perfect eyesight prevented him from making it into NASA’s astronaut selection process, so in 1993 Cliff decided to found The Tenagra Corporation as his first independent venture, serving as President, CEO and Chairman. In early 1994 the organization joined the NASA Johnson Technology Commercialization Center, an incubator designed to help entrepreneurial companies spin NASA technology out into the commercial sector. Cliff immediately realized that businesses would soon be leveraging the power of the Internet to communicate their mission out to customers, much as NASA was already doing to convey its successes stories to the public. Cliff then transitioned careers, making the leap from outer space to cyberspace, and establishing the company as the first Internet marketing and development firm in Houston. Tenagra supported a diverse client base including such notable organizations such as IBM, ING Group, Compaq, Unisys, EDS, Shell Chemical, NetIQ, US West, and Dynegy. Cliff's activities at Tenagra included designing the corporate mission, staffing the organization and its management, marketing the company, developing media relationships, creating financing strategies, acquiring clients, and, in 1998, performing the acquisition and integration of Internet Publicity Services, an online public relations firm based in the state of Washington.

Cliff also founded and coordinated the annual Tenagra Awards for Internet Marketing Excellence program, a high-profile industry awards program which provided peer-review recognition of fundamental achievements in the Internet marketing industry on a worldwide basis. In 2001, Tenagra was named to the Houston 100, recognizing the company for its sales growth over the period of 1998-2000, and the Fast Tech 50, recognizing the company as one of the fastest growing technology companies in Houston from 1999 to 2000. In its Technology Houston publication, the Greater Houston Partnership noted that “[Blue Lance CEO Umesh] Verma and other entrepreneurs like Cliff Kurtzman—who founded The Tenagra Corporation in 1993 as part of a NASA incubator and has shaped it into an internationally recognized Internet marketing agency—could well be poster children for Houston’s rise as a technology center.”

Cliff quickly received international press coverage for his activities, and became known as one of the founders of the emerging Internet marketing industry. Today Cliff still speaks worldwide on topics such a marketing, branding, and how technology is shaping the future. He has been interviewed by and/or quoted in publications such as The New York Times, Internet World, Success, FORTUNE, Information Week, Washington Technology, the Houston Chronicle, the Houston Business Journal, and Interactive PR.

Since the beginning of 2003, ADASTRO has been the vehicle that has taken the legacy of Cliff’s previous ventures to an entirely new level. And while our story has a colorful history, our sense is that our adventure is just beginning, and many of the most interesting chapters are yet to be written. Perhaps you will have an opportunity to become a part of our story, as we continue to work to shape a future full of challenges and accomplishment!