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Who's who: Bill Jackson

Bill Jackson, Triton's chief technology officer, has earned a reputation as both a literal and a figurative straight shooter. Jackson has had a hand in creating all of Triton's products, from the ATMjr to the RT5000 and FT5000.

July 13, 2003

Bill Jackson has a reputation as a straight shooter.

"You don't get any B.S. with Bill. He shoots straight with you -- except when it comes to his golf game," said Mike Cowart, operations manager for the ATM Services division of transaction processorLynk Systems. "When he answers a question, it may not be the answer you're looking for, but it's going to be the right answer."

Bill Jackson

"You don't have to be a muckety-muck to talk with Bill. You can always get him on the phone," said Neil Clark, vice president of marketing forATM Express, Inc.,one of Triton's largest distributors.

Clark remembered an instance where a prospective customer, a bingo hall, wanted to impose an unusual set of withdrawal limits on its ATM transactions. His Triton sales representative didn't think it could be done.

But when Clark phoned Jackson, "He came up with a way to do it in about three minutes," Clark said. Although Jackson's idea was ultimately nixed by the network, Clark said he appreciated his efforts.

Jackson,Triton'schief technical officer, is a literal straight shooter as well. One of his hobbies is competitive target shooting. It appeals to him, Jackson said, because "it appears to be quite easy, but in reality it's not."

And, he added, "It requires more mental effort than most sports."

The missing link

Mental effort is certainly part of his job at Triton, where one of his responsibilities is evaluating new technologies and determining which are appropriate for the manufacturer. He also serves as a key liaison between the sales/marketing and engineering departments.

"I haven't done any electrical design or written any software for a long time. That was the younger me," Jackson said. "But because I've done it in the past, it's easy for me to understand what's really involved to get a task done."

That ability has become increasingly important as the ATM market grows fiercely competitive. Perhaps the best example to date was the 9100, which in contrast to past Triton ATMs was developed for a highly targeted market segment and under strict time and budget constraints. Introduced at the 2002 Triton Distributor Conference, the 9100 now accounts for more than half the company's sales.

Triton's two newest ATMs, the RL5000 and the FT5000, were developed on similarly tight schedules. Introduced to distributors in April, they boast higher-tech features and are targeted to large chain retailers and to financial institutions -- both of which have been tough markets for retail-oriented manufacturers like Triton.

"We've got to change the way Triton is perceived by these companies, which is probably going to be the biggest challenge we've ever faced," Jackson said. "By this time next year, we should have a better idea of how well it's working."

In contrast, most of the Triton's other products have benefited from fortuitous timing.

The early years

The ATMjr, a device designed to show people how to use an ATM, was developed in 1985, at the behest of Triton's bank. "It wasn't too sophisticated," Jackson said.

Nevertheless, Frank Wilem, one of Triton's original founders, took several dozen of the demonstrators to BAI's Retail Delivery Conference where he displayed them on a card table. Encouraged by the positive response, Triton decided to make the demonstrator its first mass-marketed product.

Before then, Jackson said, the company had produced a variety of data collection devices for government agencies. Triton designed a system used to measure and record the Earth's magnetic field for the Navy, for example.

The specialized contract work was "an engineer's dream, technology wise," Jackson said -- but it wasn't lucrative.

Jackson met the three Triton founders -- Wilem, Ernest Burdette and Robert Sandoz -- at Computer Sciences Corporation, where all worked on contract projects for the federal government at Stennis Space Center. Burdette, Triton's current president emeritus, said that Jackson often played the guitar during singing sessions that sometimes followed rounds of crawfish and beer on Friday afternoons.

When he became Triton's first salaried employee in 1982, Jackson earned more than its founders, Burdette said. "We had to pay him an actual salary, since he didn't have a stake in the company. So for quite a while, he was better off financially than we were. We didn't let him forget that."

That same year, Jackson married his wife Deborah and became a father to her two children. "1982 was a big year for me. I changed jobs, got married and bought a house," he said.

Bill Jackson gets in some time on his Sea-Doo, one of the water-related activities he enjoys.

He now regrets working such long hours at Triton while still adjusting to his new family. "I have a different perspective now. I encourage the young engineers coming up to balance their work and family time," he said.

A year ago, Jackson became a grandfather -- the first of Triton's original team to do so, as Burdette is quick to point out.

Jackson designed the electronics and the housing for both the ATMjr and its successor, a scrip machine. He's had a hand in every Triton product since then, Burdette said.

Triton hired a second engineer in 1994 to help create the company's first ATM, the 9500. Jackson said the company knew it had a hit when it sold 100 of them in three months. Sales grew to 1,500 units in 1995 and skyrocketed in 1996 with the introduction of the surcharge.

Several seminal ATM distribution companies, including Card Capture Services (which sold its portfolio toE*Trade Groupin 2000),Access Cashand Hanco Systems (which sold toeFundsin 2001 and 2002, respectively), became early customers. All still do business with Triton today.

"We go back a long way together," Jackson said.

He enjoys introducing new products to distributors at the annual conferences, where he has earned a reputation as an entertaining speaker. Sam Jonas, who led Cash Resources before selling the ISO to eFunds in 2002, called Jackson "the wittiest engineer ever," adding, "Of course, Bill would be the first to tell you that bar is set pretty low."

In 1992, Jackson achieved a personal milestone, earning an MBA from the University of Southern Mississippi after attending classes several nights a week for three years -- and earning a 4.0 grade average in the process. Though his undergraduate degree is in biomedical engineering and he once entertained a notion of attending medical school, he found he "really enjoyed the business side of the business," Jackson said.

Twenty-one years into his career at Triton, Jackson entertains no notions of leaving. "I almost can't imagine what that would be like. This is like my family," he said. "I've seen every phase of Triton's life -- the good, the bad and even the ugly. Right now, it's as good as it's ever been."

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