The fastest growing company in Georgia; Industry's only PCI compliant EIPP (Electronic Invoice Presentment and Payment) provider; Harbor Payments has many firsts up its sleeve and continues to achieve stupendous growth. Founded in 2000 the company has achieved a 12,994 percent growth over five years.

In the driver's seat is, the company's founder and CEO Ashish Bahl. Energetic and go-getter to the core, Ashish is known for his business acumen and zest to trigger rapid progress in whatever he undertakes.

Mr. Bahl was formerly at iXL where he was a Senior Vice President of iXL Ventures and the founder of iXL's Financial Services Practice Group (FSPG). The FSPG provided strategic and technology services to major financial institutions seeking to leverage the Internet for business advantage. Mr. Bahl grew the practice to the largest industry component within iXL in less than one year.

Mr. Bahl holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Electrical Engineering from Vanderbilt University and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University.

TPAtlanta recently sat down with Ashish Bahl, to find out the secret of his "midas touch" in all his endeavors.

1) What were the considerations when you founded Harbor Payments in 2000?

2000 was a very difficult time to start a business. At the time when Harbor Payments was incepted, a major chunk of business was coming from dotcoms. Lots of money was being poured but the business model was unsustainable. I think it was the year 1999, when more than 50% of the revenue was coming from unstable dotcoms rather than other stable incumbents. At that juncture, we were in a position to rely on some of our anchor clients like First Data, Wachovia and Assurant. With highly reference able clients in our kitty we were able to give a jump start to our business.

2) Can you give an insight into the various strategies that has led to Harbor Payments being the fastest growing technology company in Georgia?

After we had got over the initial hiccups we set about building a strong foundation for sustainable growth. Firstly, our business model is based on the strong sales force and channel network. Wachovia, American Express and First Data are our key channel partners. We refrained from going through the direct sales model to enable us to divert those resources and funds to development and R&D. Secondly, three years ago we set up our Indian operations and we were one of the early stage companies to adopt that model. Presently, we have about 100 people overseas in our captive centers doing work for AMEX, ADP .This helps us keep our costs down, which in turn adds to our bottom line. 92% of our revenue is transaction based.

Apart from this, I think our ability to raise money is one of the key factors to our growth. We raised $40 million from Oak Investment Partners and another $40 for our startup is in the offing from venture capitalists. We are able to do it relatively easily because we have a good product line, we are profitable, we are scaling very nicely and some of the biggest companies in the world are our clients. Last but not the least is our ability to hire and retain good talent.

3) Harbor Payments is the only PCI compliant EIPP provider in the industry and you have invested in other compliance certifications like SAS 70 as well. How do you justify the resources and money spent on compliance with no visible effect on the bottom line?

We just finished our annual PCI compliance renewal and also the Visa's CISP compliance and SDP compliance from MasterCard. Harbor Payments, Invoice Harbor, which is the industry's only integrated platform to support both paper and electronic invoices through a single system is fully compliant for PCI, SOX and other regulatory requirements. Harbor Payments also provides full business continuity compliance, complete adherence to NACHA standards and guidelines and it is the only EIPP provider to offer two SAS70 Type II audits per annum.

Investing on compliance helps us, differentiate ourselves from other third or fourth level players. Also, users are able to improve their ability to manage working capital with greater visibility into expenses and receivables at all times. As organizations shift from detective to preventative compliance processes and work toward enhanced business efficiencies, Harbor Payments provides unparalleled support by providing industry compliant systems.

4) Where do you see Harbor Payments five years from now?

Our aim to reach the $200 million mark in the next five years to come. And though our product portfolio is purely as a result of an organic initiative, acquisitions are central to our strategy. For scaling up rapidly, we buy contracts from Fortune 1000 companies in related business. In India we have two lines of business our java programs and in Noida we have a scanning and imaging centre. We scan images here and key it in India. All of ADPs invoices are getting done there. We are planning to scale this business in near future. Floating an IPO is one among the plans for future.