Page 12 - RE-NJ May 2020

10 MAY 2020
BACK IN BUSINESS
Walsh relaunches construction, project management firm, with an eye on new lighting platform
Along with a timeline that shows more than 15 years
of company history, the wall outside the Walsh Company’s office is adorned with dozens of photos
of golf outings, holiday parties and other events with familiar faces in New Jersey’s commercial real estate industry.
It’s a reminder that Ed Walsh is
a man with many friends and decades of experience — two things that helped immeasurably when
he relaunched his business last September. The construction and project management firm enjoyed a fast start at the time, with a list of projects that allowed him to quickly assemble the team at his Morristown office.
“Last time I started it probably took me three years to get to 15 people, whereas this has happened almost immediately,” Walsh said during an interview in late November. “It is interesting, in that I feel like a lot of people are trying to help, which I feel great about.”
With a team that has since grown to 18, he is now refilling his pipeline after his 2018 departure from Avison Young, the real estate services
firm, which acquired the original Walsh Company in 2012. Its newest assignments include roles as a general contractor, project manager and client representative, but
Walsh has also set his sights on an altogether new business: a platform known as PoE lighting, which uses
network cables to power LED lights and provide users with greater control, efficiency and transparency than traditional fixtures.
He has undoubtedly bought into the concept. The firm’s 5,000-square-foot office in Morristown includes a retail storefront along Speedwell Avenue, which serves as the showroom for Walsh PoE Lighting, giving way to
a sleek office space that is outfitted with the technology.
“I went to see it and I fell in love with it right away,” Walsh said, recalling his visit to a PoE lighting showroom in Staten Island, in late 2018, after
he had left Avison Young. It’s largely why, despite keeping a low profile for several months, he saw the
potential to combine the new niche with his old expertise.
“I knew that was going to be a
big part of the business,” Walsh,
the firm’s president, said of PoE lighting. “But I never wanted to give up on the project management and construction because it is a big part of what I do and people know that I do that.”
WALSH’S EARLY CAREER INCLUDED
more than a decade with Gale
& Wentworth, the development
and real estate investment firm, preceding the launch of his own business in 2003. Among its many achievements over the next decade, the Walsh Company completed or managed projects in New Jersey for
By Joshua Burd
From left: John Mercurio, principal and executive vice president; Ed Walsh, president; and Hoon Lee, director, are part of the leadership team at the Walsh Company in Morristown.
Photo by Aaron Houston for Real Estate NJ