Historical Story Time - How ASC Started

Dan Everest and Steve Blancq decided to start ASC one day in 1991 in Canberra, Australia, after work in a pub named Olin’s. As US Navy Industrial Engineers working for NAVFAC and based out of Hawaii, they were helping the Australians outsource the Ops & Maintenance of Harold E. Holt, a US Navy base in the NW Cape of Australia.  Here the Aussies were going to take over possession of the Base from the US, as well as take over its management from the US Navy. Having no major Acquisition experience of major BOS contracts, the US State Department had volunteered the US Navy (Dan and Steve) to lead the Australian acquisition effort.

With deep experience innovating major USN BOS contract Acquisitions at Diego Garcia (BIOT), Midway Island, Johnston Atoll, and Singapore, Dan and Steve brought to Australia their own Tabular Format PWS templates as well as their ground-breaking Tabular Format Requirement/Resource/Costing/Pricing spreadsheet solution. These innovations were a direct result of processes Dan & Steve had perfected working as Industrial Engineers at Michelin Tire before the Navy, where they had been schooled in the art of breaking a big problem into many smaller problems, solving those small problems, and then combining the solutions into the solution to the big problem.

Returning from the NW Cape to Canberra to report on progress to Australian and US officials, the Tabular Format guys were invited to meet with the Australian Attorney General, Gale Threadgold. He was so fascinated by the concepts of “TF” that he moved Dan and Steve behind his desk and sat with his 4 direct reports on the guest side in rapt attention as the TF guys explained how everything would work at HE Holt.

Stopping by the Pub after the meeting, Dan & Steve concluded that to impress the Australian AG and his staff in such a manner, as well as previous meetings with lower level State Department officials in Washington, DC that had gone equally well, perhaps they should consider doing this not as employees of the USN, but as private consultants.

The idea continued to percolate as the very successful HE Holt BOS Contract acquisition unfolded over the next year, and with the acquisition completed and final negotiations for the Base and Housing hand-off completed in DC with support from the “TF guys”, Dan and Steve announced their resignation in Honolulu in September of 1992 and launched “Acquisition Consulting Group.” Told by the 3-Star Admiral during their exit interview, “you guys got fire in your belly, you’re going to make some mistakes, but you’ll make it.”

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