Alonzo Cobb:
CLASS OF 1964
Port Richmond High SchoolClass of 1964
Staten island, NY
Alonzo's Story
Brief Biography of Alonzo Cobb
After the army, Alonzo attended school at night, while working for various government and corporate entities. This included working on the anti-ballistic missile, being a sky marshal in the governmentÿs anti-skyjacking program, and being a production manager in the corporate world. It also included such menial tasks as taxi driving, washing dishes, changing tires and moving furniture. At Nassau Community College, he earned an AS in Chemistry, working at a chemical plant as an assistant plant manager during the day, and taking classes at night. After graduation in 1976, he enrolled at Baruch College, majoring in finance, with a minor in management science. When he earned a Regents scholarship for Vietnam veterans, he worked part time, driving a taxi and tutoring statistics, math and finance, and studied full time, completing his BBA in June, 1979.
After graduation from college, Alonzo worked for Crocker Bank in San Francisco (now part of Wells Fargo Bank) as an internal auditor, in the Divisions and Subsidiaries Group. This group audited, not the branches, but the main divisions of the bank, like credit cards, construction finance and equipment leasing. In the credit card audit, Alonzo wrote the audit procedure for determining the bankÿs exposure to the truth in lending law, which had recently been passed. It turned out the bank was too generous with its customers, giving away an estimated $500,000 per year in interest and fee reimbursements that the bank should have rightfully kept. Alonzo left the bank to earn his masters degree in economics and business at Stanford University, graduating in June, 1983. While at Stanford, he worked on a number of projects for companies, completing a logistics project for Tri-Valley Growers and a marketing research project for Doleÿs processed foods group. The logistics project saved Tri-Valley $3 million in its first year of implementation, and the marketing research project led to a $14 million increase in profits at the processed foods group; market share also increased by 9%. During his nearly 15 year stay in California, he also worked for:
Castle & Cooke (Dole bananas, pineapples, etc.) in Honduras, Central America and in San Francisco as a financial analyst. While at Castle and Cooke, Alonzo participated in three very important projects. The first one involved importing fresh fruit from Chile and Argentina into the northeastern U.S. during the winter months. This meant the fruit, like peaches, plums, grapes, etc., would sell at a very high premium. During the first year of operation, the company earned a profit of $3 million, which was 10% of total profits. The second major project was the successful completion of the capital budget for the banana and pineapple operations in Honduras, Central America. When the capital improvements were implemented, the company earned an extra $8.5 million, either through reduced costs or increased revenues. The third project involved a wholesale move into new fruit and vegetables, based on the success of the Chile/Argentina project. The new products were vine ripened tomatoes, bell peppers and cucumbers from Mexico; citrus from southern California; apples and pears, mostly from the U.S. northwest. In addition, he worked on creating greater value added salad products, like prepared, packaged salad greens. All of this led to a doubling of the companyÿs profits.
Pacific Telesis, doing marketing research and strategy. The most important project that Alonzo worked on was at PacBell Directory, not long after the AT&T breakup. During the AT&T era, the Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs) were only responsible for revenue; they never had to track costs. With the breakup, everything changed. His team had to develop a process that used accounting and statistical information as a set of management strategy tools. For example, it was shown that 2% of the companyÿs customers generated over 25% of the revenues ÿ over $150 million. This is why competitors could come into the market and quickly gain a foothold. Alonzoÿs team was also able to, for the first time, show what it cost for each sales channel to make a sale. Finally, with market surveys, it was possible to identify which issues were critical to the companyÿs customers. All of these tools were used to develop a successful restructuring of the sales force that not only greatly improved customer service and profitability, but also made it much more difficult for competitors to enter the market.
Childers, Swan & Co. and Saishahn Enterprises, doing financial planning and consulting for wealthy individuals and businesses. This involved writing a financial planning model that saved Childers, Swan over $50,000 per year in computer processing costs. He also saved a Saishahn client over $500,000 in IRS tax liability when he uncovered an embezzlement for $2 million.
He also co-headed a seminar project in Japan and California, which included translating documentation from English to Japanese. The entire week-long seminar was done in Japanese.
After returning to New York at the end of 1993, Alonzo worked for NYNEX Mobile, a wireless telecommunications firm (now part of Verizon Wireless), where he was an asst. product manager in the product development group; the digital...Expand for more
cell phones you now hold in your hand were developed by his group. During test marketing, the PCS prototype attracted nearly 11,000 customers within three months, producing over $500,000 in monthly revenue. Prior to PCS, analogue cell phones were used by businessmen and professionals exclusively for communication, and they paid a high premium for the service, typically between $0.60 and $1.00 per minute. With the PCS project, senior management was particularly concerned about cannibalization, because the new service was much less expensive than the established service ($.25 to $.35 per minute). In fact, a considerable amount of reengineering had to be done in order to squeeze costs out of the system; the new product had to be profitable at the lower price. It turned out that the customers who did switch increased their usage so much that revenue increased. Even more important, a completely new, untapped, profitable market was discovered, which was many times larger than the business/professional market ÿ consumers. Thus, the project was so successful that the parent company, NYNEX, invested $2 billion in Primeco, the resulting PCS business. Primeco was made up of four phone companies, NYNEX, Bell Atlantic, US West and Airtouch, each of which invested $2 billion, based on the results of his teamÿs work. When NYNEX was taken over by Bell Atlantic, the entire marketing department at NYNEX Mobile was eliminated, including Alonzoÿs product development group.
After leaving NYNEX, Mr. Cobb worked as a contract consultant, working primarily with banks and telecommunications firms, assisting them with accounting, financial and statistical analysis and database development. This led to a position as an Asst. Vice President at Credit Suisse First Boston, a Wall Street investment bank, where he was in charge of all the computer hardware for the Fixed Income and Derivatives Group, from purchase through final disposition. He set up a computer donation program for non-profits and schools while working there, and gave away around 500 systems. This led to a $500,000 savings for the bank, via tax write-offs and the avoidance of paying for the removal of toxic waste; computers are considered toxic waste by the government, because of the chemicals and metals in the devices.
His last major project was in the e-commerce environment, with Kavana Online, in Los Angeles. The small startup team developed a working prototype of a streaming video product with attached shopping cart and text windows. The shopping cart was particularly innovative in that, as the video was playing, products for sale could be purchased immediately, and the viewer could return to the place where he or she was at before the shopping interruption, and continue viewing the video. Unfortunately, this achievement was accomplished at the time of the dot-com bust, and funding dried up. However, it was an awesome experience, with a steep learning curve.
In addition to the corporate world, Alonzo has also worked on volunteer projects in Brazil and Africa for Maranatha and ADRA, where he helped build a church in Brazil, and two clinics in Tanzania.
In addition, heÿs taught math, science and economics in Junior Achievement and in high schools in San Francisco and New York City, and he welcomed expatriate Japanese to the U.S. for the Japan Society in San Francisco, giving the welcoming address in Japanese (he also speaks Spanish and German, and is now studying Hebrew). He also worked on a management training project for the Shanghai-San Francisco Sister Cities Management Development Program; the program was aimed at training Chinese managers in modern management as practiced in the US and other developed countries. His team was so effective in their work that, when Jiang Zemin visited San Francisco after the project was completed, he and his team members were invited to a luncheon for the Chinese leader; apparently, this was because Jiang Zemin was formerly the mayor of Shanghai.
His travels have included the US, Canada, Mexico, Honduras, Belize, Brazil, Japan, England, France, Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Portugal, Spain, Nigeria, Cameroon, Zaire, Kenya and Tanzania. There are many other places that he wants to visit, especially India, China, Korea, Australia, Antarctica, Thailand, Indonesia, Venezuela and Israel. Heÿd also like to go back to many of the places heÿs already visited.
Some of the memberships, hobbies and extracurricular activities Alonzo is involved in include: MENSA; scuba diving; reading; travel; chess; photography; bicycling; music (listening); economics; technology; mathematics and statistics.
His primary research interest is in the product/market development arena. Of particular interest is supply chaining and other technologies, like optimization techniques, statistical quality control, reengineering and just-in-time inventory management, that will give a firm a competitive advantage in the marketplace. He firmly believes that these technologies are critical in creating sustainable financial strength in todayÿs global business environment.
He's been teaching mathematics at the Legacy School for Integrated Studies, a public high school in Manhattan, since February, 2007, and has earned an MA in mathematics education at CCNY since then as well.
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