(FORTUNE Small Business) – "It's an American dream come true, right?" asks Andy Sinha, CEO of A1 Wireless, an online cellphone wholesaler based in Long Island City, N.Y., which was recently acquired by competitor Inphonic Inc. of Washington, D.C., for $20.9 million in cash and stock. Launched in 1992 by Sinha and CFO Gary Gopalani, two 37-year-old high school friends from India, A1 Wireless made the transition from a brick-and-mortar operation into an Internet shop when some of the 300 local mom-and-pop cellphone stores they supplied pushed to sell their phones over the web. With a $300,000 investment, the partners launched their site in July 2002 and shortly thereafter were activating nearly 25,000 phones a month. "I still come to work at 8:30 A.M.," says Sinha, who will join Inphonic as an executive. --I.M.