2021 Honoree GrowFL Companies to Watch
NovoaGlobal CEO and President Carlos Löfstedt
Focus on Safety
NovoaGlobal Uses Innovation to Help Communities Protect Lives BY DIANE SEARS Carlos Löfstedt is the CEO and President of NovoaGlobal, which is based in Orlando. This article is one in a series based on interviews with honorees of the GrowFL Florida Companies to Watch. For information, visit www.GrowFl.com.
Talk about how the company was started.
Very early in life, my dream was to become a CEO and business owner. I studied in Sweden for a master's in industrial engineering and management, which is a combination of engineering, economics, and management. Many people who go that route in education end up as CEOs. After my studies, I started working at a company where I had the privilege to be part of the inception of the nonprofit
54 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022 | i4Biz.com
project Vision Zero and to introduce traffic safety solutions to more than 20 countries. I was looking into starting a new subsidiary of this company in the United States. The strategy was different for the U.S. because it’s such a big country and the way of doing business is a little bit different. We’re talking about traffic enforcement — speed cameras, red light cameras, and railroad crossing, stop sign and crosswalk enforcement equipment for automating police work. In some countries, such as Sweden, this kind of business is centralized. The country buys the equipment and then manages the project. In the U.S., it’s different. You sign the contract with the government entity and then your company has to do most of the work including engineering, installation, studies, public relations, and
“MY FATHER GAVE ME SOME ADVICE THAT I HAVE TAKEN WITH ME ALL MY LIFE: IT IS NOT IMPORTANT WHAT POSITION YOU HAVE, HOW MUCH YOU WORK OR HOW MUCH YOU GET PAID. THE IMPORTANT THING IS HOW MUCH YOU LEARN”
