Kevin Tawil

And the risk of how many times somebody would break a phone or use the service was borne by us.

And operationally, they were very similar.

Somebody had a problem, they would call a call center.

We would either send a phone or send a tow truck.

They were almost identical businesses.

We actually got conviction pretty quickly.

We wanted to be in this business.

So we pursued both a buy and build strategy.

We knew that our biggest client, GTE, was looking for a provider of cell phone insurance.

So we started bidding on it because we had a seat at the table because of our relationship.

At the same time, we started talking to three players in the industry that provided cell phone insurance.

So there were three small players at the time.

The company we bought, the Merrimack Group, Lockline, and Signal.

And before that RFP concluded, we were able to actually move down the path with the Merrimack Group and close that transaction.

And that's what really launched us into the cell phone insurance industry.

Talk a little bit, if you don't mind, about that deal.

How did that come together?

It's based in Nashville.

Two partners who are former insurance agents with one of the big firms, I think Marshall McLennan, started it.

And they were in the insurance industry and saw others doing it that's niche in cell phone insurance.