Advance Computer Services was founded in 1976 by Mr. S.J. Patel, who had previously worked as a senior mainframe programmer for General Motor’s (Fleetwood Division) in Detroit, Michigan. Upon his retirement from GM, Mr. Patel pioneered global information technology by being one of the first to bring IBM Mainframe (1401) and IBM AS/400 technology from the US to India. Advance Computer Services, with 200 plus employees became a major service provider in India, as a data processing consulting company and then as a mainframe maintenance provider to the top 50 companies in India. Mr. Patel followed the IBM 1401 by purchasing several newer model mainframes through the early 90’s.

In 1992, Mr. Patel had a vision. Due in large part to his diverse industry, technical and management expertise, coupled with his strong desire to provide his employees an opportunity similar to his – of moving to and working in the United States, Mr. Patel incorporated ACS International Resources in Newark, Delaware, to provide cost-effective staff augmentation and IT consulting services to US businesses both large and small. Today, many of those first ACS employees who came to the US are now CIO’s, CEO’s and Sr. VP’s of corporate America!

In 1996, S.J. Patel’s son Milan joined ACS full-time as CEO. Milan, a Drexel University graduate and his dad had a common desire to build a company dedicated to delivering results for customers, based on the core values of personal and professional integrity. With this philosophy in mind, ACS International Resources was successful in landing and delivering on several large contracts and grew to become one of the fastest growing, privately-held companies in the United States, evidenced by ACS’ induction into the Inc. 500 Hall of Fame as a 5-time award winner (1999, 2000, 2001, 2002 & 2004).

In 2006, ACS was awarded a breakthrough outsourcing agreement, which pushed the ‘full-service’ limits and created an extremely unique test for ACS. ACS’ deal with a major US publishing company presented daunting challenges. After being sold to an investor, the company, which immediately went from a large operation to a small one, was without phones, computers, databases, networks, accounting, payroll, 401K retirement systems, a web presence, as well as the publishing software they used to exist. They went from everything to nothing. Still they had magazines to produce, deadlines to reach and web content to create.

ACS had just 45 days to design and implement a complete infrastructure, including a LAN/WAN network, e-mail services, data/voice/wireless communication, help desk, web hosting and much more. The deadline had to be successfully met in order to guarantee the publisher would continue to produce. Working around the clock, the ACS team built a complete, robust, enterprise-wide infrastructure; one that would enable the publisher to produce the same stunning magazines while also allowing future growth – and did so under budget and within the 45 days! This prompted one high ranking publishing company official to say “If we didn’t have ACS, we wouldn’t be in business!”