US SDA Deputy Administrator highlights small business growth in rural regions amid National Small Business Week [Video]

BOX ELDER, S.D. (KEVN) – It’s National Small Business Week, and as part of the National Small Business Week Roadshow, the US SBA Deputy Administrator is stopping by two small businesses in Western South Dakota on Monday and Tuesday. The first stop for the deputy administrator is a veteran-owned business in Box Elder.

With almost 90,000 small businesses in South Dakota, companies like VRC Metal Systems, founded in 2013, continue to innovate what being a small tech business in the state means.

“We do a lot of DOD work, so we work with all the services: Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Coast Guard. We work with nuclear power companies; we work with conventional power companies and space companies,” VRC Metal Systems CEO and co-founder Rob Hrabe explained.

The idea for the cold spray productsdidn’t come out of the blue. It was reinforced after an Ellsworth Air Force Base commission was meant to find new technologies for an aging …