Smith Named Largest Family-Owned Business in Houston

Houston, TX (August 9, 2023) – Smith, a leading independent distributor of electronic components and semiconductors, today announces that it has been named the largest family-owned business in the greater Houston area by Houston Business Journal. The rankings were based off the company’s 2022 sales revenue. This is Smith’s third year in a row to hold the list’s top position.

Brothers Bob and Lee Ackerley founded Smith in 1984, setting up their first office in Bob’s dining room in Houston, Texas. Since then, the company has grown to include nineteen sales offices and four regional hubs and employs more than 900 people worldwide. Smith announced back-to-back record-breaking revenues in 2021 and 2022, generating more than $12 billion in global sales over the last five years.

“We are thrilled to top the list of Houston’s largest family-owned businesses once again,” said Lee Ackerley, Co-Founder and Director at Smith. “Over the last four decades, we have continuously reinvested in our people and our processes. Those investments have propelled our expansion and development far beyond our Houston beginnings, and we will continue to pursue the growth potential still ahead of us.”

Houston Business Journal also recently named Smith one of the publication’s inaugural Best Family-Owned Business Award honorees earlier this year, which recognizes Smith’s outstanding business success and celebrates the integral part family-owned businesses play in their local economies.

“Houston is a major hub for numerous tech-centric industries and has a deep pool of talented and highly skilled workers to support our collective growth and innovation,” said Bob Ackerley, Co-Founder and Director at Smith. “Without a doubt, this environment has had a positive impact on our success, and we look forward to building upon Houston’s thriving technology sector in the years to come.”

About Smith

Founded in 1984, Smith sources, manages, and distributes the electronic components that go into everything from mobile phones and computers to appliances and automobiles. In 20 cities around the world, Smith’s legion of employees communicates in 50 languages and dialects and buys and sells components 24 hours per day, generating global annual sales in excess of $4.7 billion in 2022. Smith is always moving: helping manufacturers navigate market shifts; customizing supply chain solutions; testing components using cutting-edge technology. The support of Smith’s flexible Intelligent Distribution™ model optimizes customers’ supply chains from beginning to end, including offering customized options for IT asset disposition that deliver maximum ROI, sustainability, and security. Smith’s testing and logistics hubs in Houston, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, and Singapore cover critical areas like quality management, counterfeit prevention, and environmental safety. Smith’s operations, purchasing, and sales worldwide are seamlessly integrated with the company’s global IT infrastructure, offering real-time, global inventory and logistics visibility. Smith is the leading independent distributor of electronic components and ranks number six among all global distributors. For more information, please visit www.smithweb.com or reach out to a Smith representative any time of day at +1 713.430.3000.

###

For more information, contact:
Rich Witmer
Smith, Senior Director of Marketing
+1 713.430.2141