(NOTE: This story was originally posted to CRN.com Jan. 19.)

The Strategy

SADA Systems, a Los Angeles-based partner of Google, Microsoft and Facebook, is placing a large bet this year - $11 million - on the booming cloud industry.

As the company's physical footprint, customer base and staff expand rapidly, CEO Tony Safoian is maintaining the posture that drove his success: investing in new technologies, surrounding himself with the most-skilled employees he can find, and focusing on mid-market customers.

Safoian founded and scaled SADA by taking risks, first bringing to market Google's fledgling Apps product, then doing the same with Microsoft Office 365. He's not about to play it safe now as the cloud market explodes.

To that end, SADA - No. 342 on CRN's Solution Provider 500 - is competing with name-brand tech companies for talent, and even launching its own application development efforts.

Safoian said no one knows the limits of the market, and he's eager to find out how large the business can become.