Udelhoven Oilfield System Services Inc.

• Jurisdiction: United States
• Date: 01 October 2003
• Author: McCorkle, Vern C.
• Published date: 01 October 2003
• Author: McCorkle, Vern C.

2003 Top 49er Ranking: 21

Position Last Year: 19

2002 Revenue: $61.2 million

Number of Employees: 400

In 1970 there was Udelhoven, just Udelhoven. Today there is Udelhoven plus 400. What happened? An entrepreneurial, James Udelhoven risked everything, and in 1968 packed up his family of five young children and a wife, said goodbye to his manufacturing job at one of John Deere's Iowa manufacturing plants and headed for Alaska's oil fields.

"It was pretty risky," Udelhoven recalls, "but I knew what I could do, and I knew that I could bring some new talent to the petroleum industry." And bring some talent he did. His electronic capabilities began with his military career in radar and that, coupled with specialized training in industrial and power applications, prepared him to become one alone in oil-field technology.

"At John Deere, we had the very latest computerized machining and automated manufacturing equipment of all kinds and...