The POWER 30: Sarah Roeder

Wunderlich-Malec Engineering, Inc.

Eden Prairie-based Wunderlich-Malec Engineering, Inc. was established in 1981 and has grown across the country, having more than 10,000 completed projects under its belt. Sarah Roeder is general counsel for the company.

Wunderlich-Malec is a systems integrator, which means that it helps a variety of industries get their internal systems to talk to each other. Its clients range from data centers to theme parks. Fortunately for the company and its clients, many of the businesses were considered essential industries during the pandemic.

Eleven years ago, the company went employee-owned so that business units were set up to be entrepreneurial, not unlike a law firm, Roeder said. It leads to innovation and good opportunities for units to pursue businesses they’re interested in. Recently it assisted companies that produced vaccines and health care equipment, Roeder said.

Roeder is examining the company’s insurance needs as it grows and incorporates custom management into its wheelhouse. There are insurance requirements outside standard errors and omissions and general commercial liability policies, she said. The company’s needs for insurance go beyond even typical insurance companies.

Challenges facing the company include increased compliance, including vendor compliance, process control, cyber security and sustainability. It is a multi-disciplinary engineering company with a focus on systems, and is the fourth largest engineering company in the state. The past year has seen increased volume in the power generation market and electrical infrastructure. It maintains a large central data center, and the business units track their own data.

There’s little litigation, Roeder said, and she keeps her eyes on things the business side doesn’t want to handle. Everything’s gone pretty well in the last 40 years, she noted.

“A lot of people with a lot of brain power are figuring out solutions and the question is what are the risks,” Roeder said. “What do we not know or need outside help with?”

Compliance with laws and regulations is part of that puzzle. “Big companies comply by making sure the people they hire comply. When we have had disputes, we skew toward arbitration if necessary. We have a great bench of construction lawyers in Minnesota.”