How DataRemote & Miami Tech Works Are Bridging Miami’s Tech Talent Gap

DataRemote’s Success Hiring Tech Interns Offers lessons for the Miami Ecosystem

For Timor Brik, an attorney-turned-chief operating officer, growing a successful company is second nature. As chief operating officer at DataRemote, a telecom equipment company that helps businesses convert analog signals to digital, he’s helped grow the company from just five employees to over 50 in the past decade.

Yet, despite DataRemote’s growth, Brik encountered challenges to recruit and retain technical talent from South Florida – until a recent and exciting shift.

“Miami just wasn’t known as a technical community, up until the last few years,” Brik said.

That all changed when Brik and his company received a cold email from Juliet Bedard at Miami Dade College. In the email to Brik, she introduced new scholarship opportunities to place interns with local tech companies – part of Miami Tech Works, a program funded by a $10 million, three-year grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration aimed at bridging the gap between employers and training providers to build a sustainable tech talent pipeline.

At first, Brik was skeptical. Cold emails usually go ignored, but something about Bedard’s message stood out. “It fit our model perfectly at the time,” Brik said. “Having that pipeline gave us the opportunity to really see the talent.”

Soon after, DataRemote became one of the first companies to join Miami Tech Works. Over time, they began to interview and hire new interns, attend events, and connect with leaders in Miami’s growing tech scene.

DataRemote recently hired two interns through the new Blackstone and JPMorganChase internship scholarship program. Both interns are in the quality assurance lab; one will be running test suites on new firmware/software releases and the other will be creating security test suites.

“There’s more opportunities for students and potential employees to stay in the city and community, and they’re choosing to stay,” Brik said. “There is definitely a larger pool of applicants that possess the technical talent we’re looking for.”

For Brik, one of the most rewarding outcomes of the partnership has been watching student interns grow into full-time roles, like Gabriel Garcia, a computer science and mobile app development student at Miami Dade College who went from intern to full-time employee at DataRemote in just six months.

“I was always interested in computer science because my dad works in it – I naturally learned everything about computers,” Garcia said.

As a student, he began his trajectory in tech with a local coding boot camp at BrainStation Miami, and throughout his time at Miami Dade College, he stayed engaged with internship opportunities, new classes, and events, which were introduced by a familiar face in the tech community.

“Juliet from Miami Dade College helped me get into the Miami Codes initiative to learn Swift, the program they use to make Apple products and applications,” Garcia said. “And this program is what actually helped me get into DataRemote.”

Garcia started at DataRemote as an intern within the software development team during his initial 10-week internship program. Throughout his time, he worked on API programs to help the operations team with efficiency, and always stayed engaged and enthusiastic about the work he was doing – which caught the eye of the leadership team.

“Gabriel showed beyond the certification or degree. He showed that natural curiosity out of his own accord. He wanted to spend time in the office, and was always asking questions,” Brik said. “He showed an initiative, and people noticed that.”

Now, as a full-time employee at DataRemote, Garcia’s new role focuses on IT solutions, where he handles server management and develops applications to improve operational efficiency.

“I really dove into every task that they gave me – especially because those projects had actual business benefits,” Garcia said. “Even when I wasn’t on the clock, I was working on those projects because they were helping me learn and grow as a developer. At DataRemote, they saw how much effort I was putting in, which I think is what helped me gain the full-time position.”

Brik and Garcia are looking forward to what’s in store with Miami Tech. For Brik, investing in local talent has proven to be more than just good business – it’s a way to shape Miami’s growing tech scene. And for Garcia, the opportunity at DataRemote has been more than just a job – it’s his launching pad for a successful career.

“For any young enthusiast looking to break into tech – learn as much as you can, and take every internship and opportunity that you can,” Garcia said.

“The pipeline of talent has been really positive thanks to the programs curated by Miami Tech Works and universities across South Florida,” Brik said. “We went from not being able to recruit at all in Miami-Dade County to now having options, with talent who are familiar with the technology, as well as evolving trends in technology. It’s really exciting.”

Photo at the top of this post: Timor Brik, COO of DataRemote, pictured at right, with Gabriel Garcia, a graduate of BrainStation who interned at DataRemote and is now a full-time employee.