Our Story: How it all began

MB3 INC. focuses almost entirely on delivering web-based software that primarily helps to accelerate the Emergency Management (EM) grant process. We are based in Orlando, Florida, and that is where our flagship product, EMGrantsPro, was first launched.

MB3 president, Matt Blakely, became aware of a major need in Orlando, Florida back in late 2004. Hurricanes Charley, Frances, and Ivan had just devastated the State which caused an influx of paperwork never before seen. Upon meeting with the staff of the Public Assistance (PA) department of the Division of Emergency Management, Matt quickly decided to form MB3 to address the State's challenges. It was then that FloridaPA.org was launched, strictly as a Request for Public Assistance (RPA) management tool. The concept was simple; Applicants could submit their assistance request online, for one or all three of the disasters, and monitor each "account" while the State/FEMA made their approvals.

After a great success with all parties depending on FloridaPA.org for tracking RPAs, it seemed a natural fit to continue integrating the business process with the system, especially since the core system was already setup for such expansion. By this time a fourth major hurricane hit Florida (Jeanne), making the need even greater. State-local funding agreements (or contracts) were then made available to Applicants online upon RPA approval, where the contract template was custom-populated and could be downloaded by the Applicant for signature. The executed agreement then flagged the account as "active", which meant the eligibility paperwork was fully complete and the project management or reimbursement processing stage could commence.

By early 2005, FloridaPA.org managed almost every function that the PA staff needed to perform, including payment processing, contact logs, and closeouts, meaning the possibilities for real-time reporting were endless. During the summer of 2005, the development team at MB3 focused on re-examining the system, which was called "MB3 PA Portal" and by later that year, version 2 was launched, just before Hurricane Katrina made landfall.

The PA Portal was launched in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama as a natural fit for managing an unprecedented event and the system continued to be enhanced along the way. During 2006, the priority was to ensure the system architecture would meet the growing needs of the 4 States that had a constantly growing number of projects, thus data and documentation. A methodology was also developed to allow the core set of functionality to be shared among the States, while customizing terminology and functionality on a case-by-case basis.

In early 2007, the State of Mississippi wondered why Hazard Mitigation couldn't be managed online in a similar fashion to PA, which prompted the creation of "MB3 HM Portal", or MitigationMS.org as it is known in Mississippi. This system had many of the same features as PA, including reimbursement processing, quarterly reports, and document management, but approached the grant from a Mitigation point of view. FEMA took note of how easy it was for the State and Subgrantees to use the system and realized their eligibility approvals of HMGP projects should also be done in MitigationMS.org.

As the years went on, more States became to realize the benefits of web-based PA and HMA, with Virginia, California, and South Carolina also joining. Version 3 of MB3 PA Portal was launched in the beginning of 2008. Some States also wanted to leverage MB3's ability to develop custom tools, combining employee time sheets, purchase requisitions, and travel vouchers all under the same umbrella.

In 2012, MB3 launched EMGrantsPro, which draws upon extensive user feedback to allow for Public Assistance and Mitigation to optionally co-exist in the same system, even with other EM grants combined in one place.

Now, in early 2013, MB3 is nearing the launch of EMToolkit.com, as Applicants have requested PA tools completely geared for their unique challenges.