FEATURE : ROY RICHARDSON
Making Radio Waves :
How Roy Richardson
Took His Late Father ’ s Hobby And Turned It Into A Successful
Multi-Decade Career Culminating In Aurora InfoTech
Although many kids aren ’ t interested in their parents ' hobbies , nonetheless , following in their footsteps when it does happen is always something special . This was the case for Roy Richardson whose dad got him into communications at a young age , laying the foundations for what would become Aurora InfoTech — a premier provider of cybersecurity and IT solutions for businesses across Orlando .
FROM HOBBY TO CAREER
Growing up , Roy ’ s father was a radio amateur who liked to source and build his own radio systems to connect with people as far away as possible . “ We were living on the island of Aruba at the time , and my dad had an entire room dedicated to his radio equipment with huge antennas and stuff like that . Back in the ’ 70s , there was no internet , so this was his favorite pastime , and I started helping him out at a very young age ,” recalls Roy .
Unfortunately , Roy ’ s father passed when he was only six , meaning this hobby of amateur radio was a way that Roy could still feel connected with his dad . “ Because of this experience with my dad , I started an amateur radio club for teens when I was about 11 or 12 and was actually interviewed on TV about it . As a result , RadioShack hired me to be a technician , and from there , I started to dabble into the computer side of things more ,” says Roy .
Although Roy worked in the technology lab at his high school , it wasn ’ t until he went to the University of Miami ( FL ) that his experience with computers and technology began to take off . “ I was hired by an information systems firm in my freshman year as a draftsman and project coordinator for their IT team . They were working in a field called geographic information systems , which can be found in many different applications on smartphones today , particularly GPS . But back then , it was a very specialized field that typically only the government and military worked in ,” explains Roy .
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