NATHAN YANOVITCH

From a single store established in 1996, Nathan Yanovitch has grown Ameritel into one of the nation’s most successful wireless telecommunications Master Agents. A true entrepreneur who is intimately familiar with the challenges facing the small business owner, Yanovitch epitomizes the strength of character, charisma and leadership required to excel in the wireless industry.

Yanovitch joined the telecommunications industry in 1990 as a sales rep for PageAmerica. Riding the boom in the personal pager business, he steadily moved up the ranks into executive management as he learned the ins and outs of the emerging wireless culture. By 1996, he felt the pull of his entrepreneurial roots, and opened his own paging reseller and wireless phone retail store.

The launch of Yanovitch’s first store marked the beginnings of his long relationship with T-Mobile USA. Among the carriers he represented was OmniPoint, the first pre-paid GSM carrier in the Northeast to offer wireless service without long-term contracts. Within a year he had built one of OmniPoint’s first branded retail operations, with the look-and-feel of a corporate store. By 1998 Yanovitch had launched four more OmniPoint –branded stores across New York City’s five boroughs, and a year later his fledgling chain had become an OmniPoint Master Dealer. OmniPoint was acquired in 2000 by VoiceStream, which changed its name in 2002 to T-Mobile.

By 2006, Yanovitch had grown Ameritel’s network to 1,200 retail dealers, which were distributing more than 60,000 digital handsets monthly through carrier partners T-Mobile, Sprint, Nextel and Boost. Today, in addition to supporting its extensive retail dealer network, Ameritel operates more than 60 company-owned stores that exclusively market T-Mobile products and services. With state-of-the-art warehouses in New York, Atlanta, Miami and Los Angeles, the company is able to provide same-day or overnight delivery of inventory to all of its stores and dealers.

Yanovitch’s entrepreneurial drive extends back to his days in the food business, when he built a successful business selling handmade pasta to restaurants throughout California.

“I learned about people, how to communicate with them and motivate them,” Yanovitch says. “It was great to develop a real understanding of how important relationships and communication are in business.”

Looking for a new challenge, Yanovitch made what might seem like a 180-degree turn in joining PageAmerica. “But the people skills honed in the food business,” he explains, “are the same ones that have built Ameritel into what it is today.

“I believe in people,” Yanovitch says. “I wouldn’t be where I am today without the people behind me. I value the employees and store owners who work for me more than anything. We have a goal together, we focus together, and we grow together.”

Married with three children, Yanovitch today is focused on continuing to grow the Ameritel family: “This is a great business to be in because as wireless phones evolve from voice-only to integrated voice, data and digital entertainment, the technology keeps growing and has staying power,” he says. “There are always new possibilities on the horizon – it’s such a sophisticated piece of technology in one small device.”

As the technology evolves, so does the business of selling products and services, and Yanovitch continues to demonstrate the foresight and leadership that have made Ameritel and its retail stores a success.

“It can be a very tough business,” he acknowledges. “It has changed from a business dominated by multi-carrier stores to one where success is driven by aligning with a single carrier. Through our strong relationship with T-Mobile and our commitment to embracing all the channels through which our dealers want to sell phones, we’re ready to face the future with open arms.”