Patrick Mullaney
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SUNY CORTLAND ALUMNI NEWS SUMMER 2013 BY FREDERIC PIERCE:Y^idg atrick Mullaney ’89 spent 12 As a SUNY Cortland freshman, Mullaney years rising through the ranks of worked as a dishwasher in the cafeteria at one of the largest medical Winchell Hall, then as a bouncer and a P device companies in the world. bartender at the Dark Horse Tavern By 2004, he was managing sales for the downtown. entire state of Georgia, supervising 60 sales “I was there every Friday and Saturday representatives and being honored as the and at least one or two days during the firm’s national Distributor of the Year. week,” Mullaney said of the Dark Horse. “I Then he got fired. made a lot of money. I wanted to buy the A change in company leadership and a place a few years after I graduated, but I was disagreement over a patent for a medical never able to put it together.” device he’d helped his mechanical engineer After Cortland, he earned a master’s brother secure, ended the career from which degree in economics from the Maxwell he thought he would retire. School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at “That was a tough time,” Mullaney Syracuse University. He had his eyes on Wall recalled. “When I got fired, I did something Street, where he landed an internship and people normally wouldn’t do. I went out and initially hoped to become a bond trader. bought a boat and spent about three months Someone else, however, had his eyes on on it, reading and figuring out the next step.” Mullaney. His most fateful business contact That next step was a leap of faith. came along because of Mr. Ding-a-Ling. Heartened by the fact that most of the One of the parents Mullaney became successful entrepreneurs he’d read about friendly with along his ice cream route was a had been fired at least once before striking sales representative for Smith & Nephew, a off on their own, Mullaney began raising giant medical technology firm based in money and working with his brother Patrick Mullaney ’89 is a serial entrepreneur Memphis that does business in more than who has successfully built and grown three Michael to create VisionMed LLC; a medical device companies. ExtraOrtho Inc., a 90 countries. company based on his brother’s improved firm he founded and ultimately sold, marketed The man told Mullaney that he was a design of a device that helped surgeons a unique external fixation device, pictured good salesman and should get into medical above, used to hold severely broken bones in treat orthopedic deformities. place while they heal. sales. When the young ice cream entrepreneur Mullaney’s specialty is taking newly replied that he didn’t have a background in developed medical devices and creating prof- science, the experienced sales representative itable distribution networks of doctors and medical devices used to treat neurological and his desire to understand the funda- offered to take him on as an apprentice. medical professionals. He’d done it success- and cardiovascular diseases. Mullaney came mentals of how the economy works. Mullaney spent nearly two years barely fully for Smith & Nephew, a giant publicly on board to turn those scientific concepts “I always knew I wanted to be an entre- scraping by as an apprentice, learning the traded corporation, and he knew he could do into marketable business products with preneur,” he said. “I’m a salesman. I just medical device business from the inside out, it successfully for a company of his own. profitable sales networks. didn’t know what I would sell. “ before becoming a full-fledged sales repre- So, Mullaney spent the next two years “It’s not about money. I wanted a bigger In high school, while his peers were sentative in 1993. The company sent him to developing his dream while working challenge,” said Mullaney, who lives with his getting summer jobs at fast food Memphis for six weeks of intensive training full-time at a new job managing New York wife and two children outside of Memphis, restaurants, Mullaney, then 17, rented a that included crash courses in anatomy, sales for another giant orthopedic firm. Tenn., a national hub for orthopedic refrigerated panel truck and started his own kinesiology, physiology and metallurgy. Finally, the timing was right for the launch of companies. “I wanted something where I “Mr. Ding-a-Ling” ice cream franchise. He found he enjoyed the challenge of ExtraOrtho, Inc., another new venture. It could say ‘that implant that saved that He was behind the wheel seven days a the business. He especially liked engaging in was a success. Within three and a half years, person’s life is in there because my team and week, selling pre-packaged ice cream out highly technical conversations with surgeons ExtraOrtho, Inc., was sold to a global ortho- myself invented it; because I put private of the brightly colored vehicle. Truck rental and advising them in the operating room pedic manufacturer. equity investors together to make this and ice cream cost him about $700 a about how to use new products. But Mullaney was just getting started. company into something.’ And that’s exciting.” month, but by the end of the summer he “You’ll be in there with doctors who are He created a third company, Arrowhead Mullaney traces the roots of his entre- could clear $3,000 or $4,000, he said. highly trained, very smart, and you’re in Medical Device Technologies, which brought preneurial success back to two transfor- Soon, he was renting a second truck and there advising them through a surgery to market a new type of fusion device used mative experiences he had as a young man: paying one of his friends commission to where the patients are on the table, and to fix deformities of the toes. SUNY Cortland and Mr. Ding-a-Ling. drive. He followed it with a third for special they’re listening to you. I loved it. Loved it! I Last year, Mullaney additionally was “Cortland is a great place to give you a events around the Albany, N.Y., area. still do surgeries maybe four or five times a recruited to the board of directors of good foundational understanding of “It pretty much put me through month now. I used to be in surgery four or NexGen, Inc., a company that designs networking; people skills,” said Mullaney, a college,” Mullaney said, noting that the five times a day. I was working 12-hour, former business economics major. “It’s a income, coupled with support from his 14-hour, sometimes 20–hour days.” place that breeds a kind of entrepreneurial parents and some college loans, allowed Mullaney’s six weeks of training in spirit. All my friends, all my fraternity him to attend college. Memphis did more than make him an asset brothers were always out doing something– “It also taught me about distribution, in the operating room. It enabled him to someone’s working at this place, someone’s which is what I do today. It taught me what meet his wife, Randi Jo, a Memphis native. working at that place, we were always you buy product for, what your goods sell The couple struck up a conversation in a working – and I think it’s because we for, what your margins should be.” nightclub over the resemblance the shirt weren’t handed silver spoons when we were Mullaney’s work ethic was instilled in she was wearing had to the “puffy shirt” growing up.” him by his parents at a very young age. He on a then-popular “Seinfeld” episode. Mullaney grew up in the Albany, N.Y., and his siblings were always up early on area, one of four children in a middle-class weekends and always had odd jobs. When family. A competitive swimmer and baseball he borrowed money from his parents to player in high school, he was attracted to start his endeavors, he always paid it back Cortland by the sports culture on campus on time. Xdci^cjZYdceV\Z&+ 2 8DAJBCHSUMMER 2013 PRESIDENT’S Message SUNY Cortland’s entrepreneurial spirit BY ERIK J. BITTERBAUM EgZh^YZci Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary biology, once considered, SUNY Cortland can both groom future success an annual business idea competition for several years, and the said: “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor stories and help revitalize the nation’s economy. College has an active Entrepreneurship Club. the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the The College is already a major economic engine in Central Last fall, the College stepped up its efforts and offered a most adaptable to change.” New York. It is Cortland County’s largest employer and last two-course economics sequence in entrepreneurism. Taught Darwin’s observation applies to more than island birds year generated more than $250 million in regional economic by a local businessman, students learn how to successfully and tortoises. It helps inform College educators about what activity. In addition, we offer the largest nationally accredited turn an idea into a profitable venture by developing plans for they must do to prepare students for success in the modern teacher education program on the East Coast. As such, the a viable business. world. College not only prepares young people for careers, but SUNY Cortland students also are gaining experience Most SUNY Cortland alumni would probably agree that molds the educators who will nurture the nation’s future working with local entrepreneurs through the College’s their College experience made them stronger; whether it workforce.