Category: Business

Two decades after its founding, HX5 has grown into a federal contractor with more than 1,000 employees working across 34 states and 90 government locations. The company, led by sole owner, CEO, and president Margarita Howard, celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2024. HX5 is a service-disabled veteran and women-owned business based in Florida. Its specialty…

Walk through the offices of some government contractors and you might find a polished lobby, a high-profile address near Washington, D.C., and brochures that suggest a much larger operation. Those signals can impress visitors. Margarita Howard decided they could wait. When she started HX5 in 2004, Howard put her money behind operational tools that clients…

Leaving the military rarely means leaving behind everything a service member learned, and HX5 has built its veteran hiring approach around that idea. Under CEO Margarita Howard, the company treats accountability, attention to detail, and operational security, qualities common in military life, as assets that carry directly into government contracting work. Howard’s own service in…

Nearly every defense contractor in the country is chasing the same small pool of cleared STEM workers, and the numbers explain why. National Defense Magazine found that 82 percent of companies in the defense industrial base have trouble locating qualified STEM candidates, while ManpowerGroup’s 2024 research put the broader figure at 71 percent of U.S.…

Not every founder building a government contracting firm thinks about accounting systems when they are still drafting their first business plan. Margarita Howard did. When she started HX5 in 2004, she prioritized the systems her clients would need to trust over the appearances her competitors were busy cultivating. Building Audit-Ready Systems From Day One Federal…

There is a common misconception that small businesses must prove themselves through wins before they can invest in serious infrastructure. Margarita Howard took the opposite view at HX5. The company built its operational foundation before its contract portfolio justified it and that sequencing gave HX5 a durably competitive position in federal markets from the start.…

Running a government contracting firm requires navigating federal regulations, winning competitive bids, retaining skilled talent, and sustaining the institutional relationships that keep contracts flowing. Margarita Howard has managed all of those demands for more than two decades at HX5, a Fort Walton Beach firm that has grown into a 1,000-plus-employee operation with contracts at 90…