HispanicBusiness

The company's growth rate started decelerating to about 60 percent during 2006 due to Congress's delayed approval of defense appropriations bills, says TerraHealth Chairman and CEO Ted Terrazas. The delay had a significant impact because contracts with the Department of Defense account for about 80 percent of TerraHealth's business. "We look forward to eventually resuming double-digit growth," he adds.

TerraHealth has taken several steps to boost revenues in the highly competitive and fragmented health care industry. The company is diversifying beyond government contracts by opening a commercial services division and an international division within the next few months.

"We want to do contingency planning and first-response training in Latin America, and we have bids in El Salvador, Argentina, and other countries," Mr. Terrazas says.

His company is among 24 of the Hispanic Business 100 Fastest-Growing Companies based in Texas, home to more on the list than any other state. Florida topped the list last year but ranks second this time around (22). California (15) is third and Virginia (six) is fourth. Among the four states, Virginia posted the highest employment growth (213.7 percent) while Florida has the lowest (86.4 percent). Florida finished with the highest revenue growth (333.7 percent) followed by Texas (311.9 percent).

Some companies sit high on this list but finish lower on the Hispanic Business 500, which does rankings according to the latest annual revenues. For example, No. 1 Liberty Power is No. 63 on the Hispanic Business 500 and No. 4 TerraHealth is No. 213.

Wholesale continues to dominate our fastest-growing list, although the sector accounts for only 13 businesses, up from 11 last year. Wholesale's overall revenues increased $3.69 million from 2002 to 2006. The sector accounts for 42.3 percent of all Hispanic Business 100 Fastest-Growing Companies list revenues.

By contrast, the service sector has the most companies on the list with 43 and had a five-year revenue gain of $3.03 million. Service businesses accounted for 36.8 percent of the list's collective revenues.

The number of companies in the construction sector increased from 22 to 24. However, the construction industry's percent of total fastest-growing list's revenues dropped from 37.9 percent to 9.6 percent. The number of companies in the finance sector declined to from six to two while manufacturing dropped from 10 to eight.

As the only independent supplier of retail electricity on the list, Liberty Power is a Hispanic-owned trailblazer in an evolving industry.

Earlier this year, Liberty Power issued a "report card" comparing its prices with industry competitors. "We want to position ourselves as a thought leader in the industry that happens to be Hispanic-owned," Mr. Hernandez says.

It does business in 14 of the 20 states with laws that allow such small independent companies to supply electricity.

"The market regulations and rules in the other six states don't make sense for us right now," Mr. Hernandez says. New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts are key states for the company because they have large Hispanic populations and Fortune 500 companies that value supplier diversity, Mr. Hernandez says.

During the second half of this year, the company will launch an advertising campaign targeting Hispanic companies and residences, largely in the Northeast. The campaign will include Spanish-language and English-language advertisements on television and radio, and in magazines.