Building Central Tox: How a Veteran Turned Regulatory Expertise Into a Laboratory Business

Starting a business is hard under any circumstances. Starting one in a heavily regulated healthcare field, with federal contracts as the target market, requires a different kind of preparation.

When Michael Schmitt founded Central Tox LLC in 2014, he was not working from a blank slate. He brought two decades of military leadership, several years of top-level pharmaceutical and medical device sales, and a working understanding of how compliance-driven organizations actually function. What he built in the years that followed reflects a deliberate, systems-first approach, the kind that separates durable businesses from ones that stall under the weight of their own growth.

Why Toxicology, and Why Federal

The decision to launch a toxicology laboratory was not arbitrary. It came out of years spent operating at the intersection of clinical practice, regulatory compliance, and organizational performance.

Michael Schmitt’s time at Pfizer and Medtronic gave him a clear view of how healthcare organizations succeed and where they fall short. The failures he saw most often were not technical. They were operational. Systems that could not scale. Compliance functions that lagged behind growth. Processes that depended on individuals instead of structure. Those patterns shaped his vision for Central Tox from the start.

He saw a chance to build something different: a laboratory that treated regulatory compliance not as a constraint to manage, but as a competitive advantage to develop. In a federal contracting environment where government officials measure, document, and evaluate performance, that distinction matters.

Launching under the operating name Semper Fi Labs was a deliberate signal too. Rooted in his military background, the name reflected a commitment to the same standards of reliability and accountability that military service demands.

Building the Infrastructure First

Many startups in regulated industries make the same mistake. They build the product and figure out compliance later. Schmitt reversed that order.

From the outset, Central Tox was designed around the operational and regulatory requirements of its target environment rather than retrofitted to meet them after the fact. That approach required real upfront investment in people, processes, and technology. It also created a foundation that could support growth without sacrificing quality.

One of the most significant early decisions was developing Elevate, a proprietary laboratory information system tailored to Central Tox’s needs. Rather than relying on commercial platforms built for general laboratory use, Schmitt led the development of a custom system shaped around the workflows, compliance requirements, and reporting demands of federal healthcare contracting.

The advantages compounded over time. Elevate gave the organization flexibility to adapt as regulations evolved. It improved workflow efficiency across the lab. And it reduced the friction that builds when a team forces generic software to fit specialized processes. In a business where precision is non-negotiable, infrastructure designed to match the actual work, rather than approximate it, made a measurable difference.

What Federal Contracting Actually Requires

Working with the Department of Veterans Affairs and other federal agencies is not like serving commercial clients. Expectations differ, evaluation criteria are formal and documented, and performance carries consequences well beyond any single contract.

Central Tox holds a National Memorandum of Understanding and an Interservice Security Agreement, credentials that reflect a high level of trust and technical capability in the federal healthcare contracting space. These do not come quickly. They result from sustained, demonstrable performance.

The clearest evidence of that performance comes from Central Tox’s CPARS ratings. Government contracting officials complete Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System evaluations, not the contractor. They assess performance across five areas: quality of deliverables, adherence to schedule, cost control, management effectiveness, and regulatory compliance. Exceptional ratings are not a baseline. They signal that a contractor has consistently delivered above what the contract required.

Central Tox has earned multi-year exceptional CPARS ratings on active Department of Veterans Affairs contracts. In an environment where contracting officers document and use performance data to weigh future awards, that record carries real weight.

Michael Schmitt has been direct about what those ratings represent. They are not a marketing achievement. They are an operational one, the product of the systems, the people, and the standards the organization has held since its founding.

The SDVOSB Distinction

Central Tox holds Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business certification, a designation that reflects both Schmitt’s military background and his commitment to building an organization that lives up to the values of that service.

In federal contracting, SDVOSB status opens access to set-aside contracts and programs that support veteran-owned businesses. But certification alone does not produce results. What Central Tox has shown is that the SDVOSB designation and exceptional contract performance can go together, that a veteran-owned business can compete on operational merit and win.

That matters beyond the business itself. It reinforces a larger point about the value veterans bring to regulated industries. The qualities that make someone effective in military service- the ability to build reliable systems, develop capable teams, and hold standards under pressure- translate directly into the demands of federal healthcare contracting.

A Model for Veteran Entrepreneurship

The story of Central Tox is not really a story about toxicology or laboratory operations. It is a story about what happens when a leader who has spent decades mastering disciplined execution decides to build something from the ground up.

Michael Schmitt did not launch Central Tox because it was the easiest opportunity available. He pursued it because he saw a gap his specific mix of skills and experience positioned him to fill, and because he was willing to build the infrastructure to do it properly.

The result is an organization that holds federal credentials that are hard to earn, maintains performance ratings most contractors never reach, and continues to grow by doing exactly what it set out to do at launch: deliver reliable laboratory services to federal healthcare clients with precision, accountability, and a steady commitment to operational excellence.

That is what regulatory expertise looks like when it is built into a business from the beginning rather than added as an afterthought.