EZ Fire
Long Island City, NY 11101
Locations
EZ Fire
President
EZ Fire
Key Contacts
Owners, Principals & Senior Executives
Rafael Alfau's Bio
Rafael Alfau has a longstanding interest in electronics that was sparked at age 13 when he received a "Science Fair 150 in 1 Electronic Project Kit" as a gift. He quickly completed all 150 experiments, which led to his passion for the field. With an education in electronics, Rafael began his career as a junior repair tech for fire alarm control boards at the component level. During this time, as a proof-of-concept, he successfully and single-handedly re-designed a critical component of the digital portion of a main control board with a new Microchip microprocessor, which significantly reduced the parts count and increased reliability.
After nine years in the fire alarm industry, Rafael joined a global flight safety simulation company where he was responsible for maintaining and troubleshooting expensive FAA-certified simulators, including flight controls, computer-controlled hydraulic systems, cockpit voice communication systems, and power systems, for naming a few. During his tenure there, he also designed a custom telephony communication and alert system to notify the technical team of incidents in the simulators while in flight.
Eventually, Rafael returned to his passion, the fire alarm industry, and took on various roles, including bench tech, fire alarm tech, installer, design engineer, programmer, and independent consultant. He felt that to impact the industry, he needed to understand every aspect, so he chose to "wear all the hats" and gain a comprehensive understanding of all aspects of the industry. In continuing with that path, Rafael made life safety-related presentations in NYC at the Museum of Natural History, the Botanical Garden, and the New York Society of Architects (NYSA), to name a few. With over 30 years of experience in the fire alarm industry, Rafael currently runs his team at EZ Fire. Also, he focuses on other businesses he owns and personal projects he is always working on.
Rafael remains passionate about the industry and regularly visits job sites to refine processes and procedures, validate, refine, and improve them firsthand, or “take a rest from the office and go be at the home base.” He is known as a visionary and futurist. He holds originality in high regard, often stating, "I will go and live in a cave, create and invent without outside contamination, and come out of the cave with things that genuinely are out of this earth."
Those who work with and are close to Rafael are familiar with the original and unique statements he holds in high regard:
“We state that you are our partner and not our customer. Ensuring your success will ensure and develop a lasting and successful business relationship. Your success is our success!”
“We achieve teamwork when all team neurons fire in sync. My job is to compose the symphony, direct the ensemble, leave the conducting stand and allow the ensemble to continue playing.”
"To change an industry, you must wear all the hats. To participate in an industry, you don't like wearing hats."