Who I Am, and Why Phi-Tech Was Founded

I didn’t start Phi-Tech because I wanted to build another IT company.

I started it because I kept seeing the same thing over and over again.

Businesses being told everything was fine.

Systems that looked “good enough” on the surface.

People trusting that what they were paying for was actually being delivered.

And then, when something finally broke, everything unraveled at once.

That pattern stuck with me for years before Phi-Tech ever existed.

Where This Started

My name is Danny Hernandez Jr.

Before anything else, I’m a husband, a dad, a friend, and a neighbor. My family comes first. That’s not just something I say, it’s how we run Phi-Tech as well. Family always comes first, both at home and in our office.

I’ve been in IT since October of 2005, 21 years, WOW! Over the years, I’ve worked across just about every type of environment you can think of. Large enterprise organizations, small one-PC offices, and government systems supporting the Department of Defense, DHS, and other federal agencies.

But the interest started long before that.

Back in 7th grade, sitting in an English class, we were asked what we wanted to be when we grew up. This was the mid-90s. IT wasn’t a clear path yet. There wasn’t a roadmap.

But I knew I wanted to be around computers.

At the same time, I was growing up around business. Both of my parents were successful in their fields, and I spent time shadowing them in their offices. That combination shaped how I see IT to this day. It’s not just about fixing machines. It’s about how technology supports the business behind it.

Early Lessons That Changed Everything

My first real opportunity came at a large orthopaedic practice here in El Paso.

This wasn’t a small operation. Hundreds of employees, multiple physicians, multiple locations. High stakes, real impact.

I was given a chance most people don’t get that early in their career. And I took it seriously.

One of the first major projects I worked on was integrating an in-house Microsoft Exchange environment with a Goodlink server to deliver email to early smartphones. At the time, that was cutting-edge.

But what really stuck with me wasn’t the technology. It was the impact.

At one point, I noticed something small. Network traffic behaving differently across systems. That curiosity led me to uncover a routing issue where traffic was unnecessarily leaving the network and looping back in through a different connection.

Fixing that didn’t just clean up a configuration. It improved performance, reduced upload times, and cut overtime hours significantly.

That was my first real understanding of business impact driven by IT.

Later, I built a system that allowed referring physicians to submit patient referrals electronically instead of waiting on hold for hours. What used to take four hours became a 30-second process.

That’s when it clicked.

IT, when done right, changes how a business operates.

The Moment Things Shifted

Toward the end of my time there, I started visiting smaller clinics in the area to deploy that system.

That’s where everything changed.

I walked into offices that didn’t have the same level of support. Systems were outdated. PCs were slow. Staff were frustrated. Work was harder than it needed to be.

These were the same types of places where people like my grandmother would go for care.

And it hit me.

I had been fortunate enough to start my career in an environment where every vendor wanted to help, where resources were available, and where IT was taken seriously.

That same level of support wasn’t reaching the rest of the community.

If I wanted to make a real impact, it wasn’t going to be in large enterprise environments.

It was going to be here, with the small businesses that needed it the most.

Why Phi-Tech Exists

Phi-Tech exists to close that gap.

Not by selling technology, but by helping businesses understand and use it the right way.

Too many companies are treated like transactions. A monthly bill. A support ticket. A quick fix.

That’s not how IT should work.

A good relationship isn’t built on reacting to problems. It’s built on partnership.

That means:

• Understanding where the business is going

• Helping them make informed decisions

• Balancing time, money, and effort in a way that actually supports growth

And it goes both ways.

We expect our customers to communicate with us. To bring us into conversations early. Whether they’re expanding, downsizing, or making changes, those decisions impact their technology, and we need to be part of that process.

How I Approach the Work

My philosophy is simple.

Do the job right.

Speed comes from preparation, experience, and investing in people. Not from cutting corners.

When it comes to security, we mitigate what we can. For what we can’t, we plan. We look at impact and prepare for worst-case scenarios.

Accountability is expected. I tell every person who joins Phi-Tech the same thing. I hire adults. That means clear communication, ownership of work, and no chasing people for updates.

And above everything else, honesty is non-negotiable.

Whether it’s a difficult conversation with a client about the state of their network, or an internal conversation about performance, there’s no room for anything else.

The Reality of the Market

One of the hardest parts of running Phi-Tech has been helping businesses see where they actually stand.

El Paso has a strong family culture. It’s something I value deeply.

But it also leads to decisions like “we have an IT guy,” when in reality it’s someone helping on the side without the experience or structure needed to support a business environment.

I’ve seen both sides of that. I started there myself.

The problem is what happens over time.

Unpatched systems. Weak security. Compliance gaps. Operational slowdowns.

All to save a little money upfront, but at a much higher cost later.

What Phi-Tech Is Really About

At its core, Phi-Tech is about helping businesses turn IT into an asset.

Not a black hole of expense. Not something you only think about when it breaks.

But something that supports growth, improves operations, and creates predictability.

We’ve worked with some of our clients for over five years.

What changes isn’t just their technology. It’s how their business runs.

Fewer surprises. More control. Better outcomes.

Why I Still Do This

What drives me is this community.

If we can bring enterprise-level thinking and execution into small businesses, we change more than just their systems. We improve how they serve their customers.

That impact matters.

Legacy matters.

In a city where everyone seems connected in some way, I want my kids to grow up hearing that their dad did things the right way.

That we built something honest. Something that helped people. Something that made a difference.

That’s what Phi-Tech is built on.

If you’ve worked with IT long enough, you know one thing is always true.

Things aren’t always what they seem on the surface.

The question is whether you have visibility into what’s really going on.

Because you can’t fix what you can’t see, I'm here to fix that.