Corvus International CEO Tim Morris got his start buying, selling and leasing real estate all over the world for General Motors, and he says the lessons he learned have helped him develop about $1.5 billion worth of Florida properties.

One of those lessons is that all construction projects can be boiled down to essential parts and replicated for efficiency, in the same way GM makes cars.

"Eighty percent of a project is repetition. Twenty percent is specific to an area," says Morris, who is 47. "It's a question of how much we can standardize the total process of construction to delivery of a finished project."

Since he entered the Florida market in 2000, Morris has used the GM project management model to develop industrial, upscale housing and mixed-use projects, all managed by a staff of 32, most of them in Corvus' office in Birmingham, Mich. Morris and his partners, Larry Lipa and Tim Vining, scout out new sites, pull together teams of architects, planners and builders, and manage them as they develop.

Corvus built Positano on the Gulf, 29 condominiums priced at $2 million and up on the site of the former Holiday Inn on north Longboat Key. He's constructed the tallest building in Manatee County-the 15-story Bel Mare at Riviera Dunes, soon to be joined by two similar-sized towers-and is on track to be one of the area's biggest developers with his planned $1 billion Sanctuary Cove mixed-use development on U.S. 301 near the Manatee River.

And he's also set his sights on the lower end of the market, with plans to build much-needed affordable housing. (See story below.)

With so much of Corvus' focus on the Florida market, Morris plans to move the company's headquarters to the site of the former Hibbs Farm and Garden center on Fruitville Road and Lemon Avenue, where Corvus is developing the $55 million Avalon project. Recently approved by the city after a year of wrangling over density and other issues, Avalon will have four stories of condominiums over one level of parking. The west end of the property will have about 15,000 square feet of retail and an additional 68,000 square feet of high-end self-storage units. The company's 15 executives will occupy about 4,000 square feet. A sales office is scheduled to open on the site later this month.

Other Corvus projects include a 1.5 million-square-foot industrial park in Pasco County and an industrial park on an 800-acre site in Flagstaff, Ariz. He says he's also looking at projects in Baltimore and Atlanta. "We know industrial very well and will continue to do it," says Morris.

Morris has graying hair and a six-foot-four athletic frame that he keeps in shape by playing tennis and golf. He's liberal with his cell phone number and answers his own calls. His booming voice hints at his military background. The son of an Army command sergeant major and the youngest of four brothers who graduated from West Point, Morris said his experience there gave him a successful foundation.

"It left an imprint on who I am. I carry it with me on a daily basis," Morris says. "It made me strong and confident, and taught me to do things right the first time."

Morris says he also learned the value of surrounding himself with good people. "Our motto is to find the most capable people possible and give them full autonomy. If you get big, inefficiency creeps in."

After graduating from West Point, in 1982, Morris attended graduate school in Germany, earning a master's degree in finance. He moved to Michigan and was studying to be a stockbroker when the October 1987 stock market crash scuttled those plans.

Through his West Point connections, Morris secured a job in industrial real estate near Detroit. His first big deal was landing a tenant for a large industrial building during a soft market. "I got a new Cadillac and a big commission check, and that's what launched me," he says.

When companies started shedding employees and facilities in the early '90s, Morris decided to be a "liaison for companies, acting as their real estate department." He pulled together a handful of companies operating under the Corvus umbrella to handle everything from site planning through construction and move-in. Morris landed a lucrative deal handling all the real estate work for Heartland Industrial Partners, a then much-heralded private equity fund started by David Stockman, budget director in the Reagan administration. Morris bought, sold and leased billions in real estate holdings for the fund for about four years.

Heartland is now under scrutiny for its accounting practices and the bankruptcy of Collins & Aikman Corp., an auto supplier based in Troy, Mich. Stockman resigned as chairman in January this year, and institutional investors are suing Heartland. About 70 percent of Corvus' financing comes from private pension equity funds, but not Heartland's fund, Morris says.