TAMPA - John Sykes built Tampa's Sykes Enterprises from nearly nothing into a global powerhouse in the outsourcing field, largely by buying up other similar companies.

That's his name on a downtown skyscraper.

Now Sykes, 71, has similar expansion plans for the small community bank that he and several friends founded in Tampa last year.

Sykes has recently taken the chairman's title of NorthStar Bank in Tampa, and he wants it to start acquiring other like-minded community banks in a drive to expand the company prudently but rapidly.

"I like to build things," Sykes said in an interview. "I built Sykes Enterprises from nothing into the company it is today."

NorthStar already has an informal short list of potential deals he would like to do in the next six months, starting in Florida, though he declined to name what companies might be on that list.

It would represent a significant shift for a small but closely watched local venture.

Privately held NorthStar started as a project among some of the Tampa Bay area's wealthiest and most prominent businesspeople. Among them: Kiran Patel, who started and later sold WellCare Health Plans and is one of Tampa's most prominent philanthropists; Marty Traber, a partner at the law firm Foley & Lardner; and Frank Sanchez, chief executive officer of Renaissance Steel and a former candidate for Tampa mayor.

Several of them invested millions of their own dollars to launch a bank that better reflected the ethnic, racial and spiritual diversity of the area. Sykes and Patel are the largest single investors in the company, though he declined to say at what level. Too often, they say, local businesspeople and residents were neglected by big national banks or exploited by check-cashing services and payday loan outlets.

The bank, which started operations last autumn, doesn't necessarily have lower lending standards than other financial institutions. Rather, it focuses on a highly personal approach by its founders, executives and investors to reach out to communities where they live.

So far, the bank has attracted about $39 million in deposits and investor capital, according to Sykes. It has loaned out about $20 million, with about 65 percent going to real estate projects such as occupied doctor's offices. Less than 20 percent has gone to residential real estate loans.

Beyond that direct business, Sykes is pushing the bank to also offer a more informal service of matchmaking. If the bank can't loan money directly, perhaps it can make introductions to outside financiers, government grant offices or well-connected lawyers.

For NorthStar's acquisition plans, some of the first pieces are in place.

Sykes was already the chairman of the holding company that operates NorthStar. (It also operates a small insurance company.) Recently, he also took the chairman's title of the bank. Before that move, the chairman was Gene Marshall, who had agreed to start the company as chairman. He will remain on the board.

There are a lot of potential targets.

Of more than 8,600 banks in the United States, about 8,300 are considered "community banks" that focus on personal service, make local credit decisions and have local ownership, according to the Independent Community Bankers of America. Now could be a good time to go on a buying spree. Sykes noted that in times of tight credit such as these, acquisitions could come cheaper because sellers can't command as much for their companies.

Rather than hire outside investment bankers to scout out potential buys, Sykes said he plans on using talent inside the company and on its board to make connections and reach out to potential target banks.

He said he would like to start acquiring some of the banks on his short list in the next 12 months, if not 6 months.

In a larger sense, Sykes said he wants NorthStar to become the kind of bank he needed decades ago when he got into business. In the late 1970s, when he went looking for loans to launch Sykes in North Carolina, bank after bank turned him down. They simply didn't want to loan money for a service company, rather than a company with assets such as a factory.

He had less than $10,000 in the bank and no major assets to leverage.

Eventually, he met a sympathetic banker who "simply liked me," he said, and helped arrange a cooperative deal with a government-backed small business loan. It's all he needed to get going.

In 1993, the headquarters moved to Florida and refocused operations on information technology outsourcing services.

The real expansion came when Sykes started acquiring other companies. In Europe alone, he did more than 17 deals. Sykes last year generated $710 million in revenue. He still owns about 18 percent of the company, according to records with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

He likely will keep the chairman's title for a few years, he said, "until I work myself out of a job."

Researcher Michael Messano contributed to this report. Reporter Richard Mullins can be reached at  (813) 259-7919  or rmullins@tampatrib.com.