This month we took time out to chat to Bowcliffe tenant and Managing Director of Elitemicro, Lee Read. Lee let us in on the secrets of his successful IT solutions company, why Elitemicro pride themselves on an approach unlike any other, and more about his adventurous life on two wheels outside of work…
Name: Lee Read
Position at Elitemicro: Managing Director
When was Elitemicro set up? Elitemicro celebrated its 10th birthday in February 2016.
What does a day in the life of Lee look like?
Very varied, some days it’s project work, some days support-type activities and other days I’m working on the general day-to-day activities that running a business generates. I really enjoy what I do and I think that very much comes through in the approach and quality of our work as a company.
Tell us a little about Elitemicro – when was it set it up and what makes it different from other IT managed services providers?
Elitemicro was initially set up as an entity to allow myself to become a contractor. However, the financial downturn saw that market effectively collapse as organisations ended any non-essential projects. So a new plan, plan B, was invented.
We began working from a small, shared office space and as new projects were delivered for customers, the ‘Managed Service’ element grew quickly. This area is now the core of the Elitemicro business.
Over the last few months, we’ve been working with some customers in a consultative capacity where they are using some of the biggest players in this space.
In my opinion, Elitemicro is different from other managed IT solutions companies for a number of reasons. As a team, there’s more personality to our approach and as a customer, you’re unlikely to get the same movement of account manager to account manager (which is typical of many other IT companies). As a smaller company, we have the ability to be much more agile; changes that can take months to go through the various parts of the larger organisations are often reduced to days.
Certainly, my opinion on how to deal with the structure of the organisation as it grows has changed and I hope that will enable us to retain our advantages.
Why in your mind do companies so desperately need managed IT solutions?
For those not familiar with the term, ‘Managed Service’, it is essentially all about taking a step away from the traditional method of reactive support and moving towards a much more proactive approach to managing the client’s IT systems, whether they are on-premise, cloud-based or a mixture of the two.
For all our Managed Services clients, their systems are constantly monitored by our specialist software, which then logs issues directly into our ticketing system for an engineer to investigate and resolve. This enables us to resolve issues before they escalate to the point of outage for the customer.
I think there’s any number of reasons that a company would come to us rather than directly recruit an IT member of staff, the biggest being:
- Economies of scale – in many cases, it is far more cost effective for us to deliver the IT service as we already have the specialist infrastructure in place. This means we are generally able to run a much higher ratio of devices to engineers. Notwithstanding the issues of having a single member of staff responsible for all your systems, leave, illness, etc.
- Enhanced skill set – even if an organisation has internal IT employees, we are often brought in to support a particular area of the IT system that falls outside the skill set and expertise of employed staff. We happily work alongside them to provide the service.
How many people are there in the Elitemicro team?
We currently have four staff members at Elitemicro. Three technical (myself included) and one finance/admin. Between the technical team, we have over 80 years combined experience within IT at blue chip organisations looking after 10,000+ machines.
What sort of customers/clients do you have? Do they spread across a variety of business industries and what are the main services you provide them with?
We have clients from a number of different sectors, including Manufacturing, Financial, Healthcare and Charities. Although the fundamental IT requirements don’t generally differ by huge amounts, the legislation and rules regarding data and data storage can.
The main service we provide is Managed Services, but depending on the client’s needs, that in itself can take many different forms, especially with larger organisations. We also offer consultancy, business grade internet connections, cloud backup/hosting, Voice over IP telephony solutions and project work.
For example, we have just agreed an order to migrate 400 devices to Windows 10, alongside some additional work to help the organisation move seamlessly to The Cloud.
What makes Bowcliffe Hall the perfect base for your Company?
Prior to moving to Bowcliffe Hall, we were based about 10 miles away at Thorpe Park. The primary consideration for us was to be close to the motorway network, as we deal with clients across Yorkshire and none of us live locally.
We’d been looking to relocate for some time but simply couldn’t find the right place. After coming to Bowcliffe Hall to look around, I went back to the office and simply announced “We’re moving!”
I felt Bowcliffe projected the right image for us and seriously, who wouldn’t want to work here?
We have to know… are you a Mac or PC man?
Oh, good question!
I had a MacBook for many years and loved it, in the main, they just work and their designs are beautifully engineered.
However, in the commercial world where standards and control over the system are required to reduce the support burden, Apple is still a way behind. I think the lack of Mac client software for mainstream business software also has an impact on their use within the workplace. However, the widespread adoption of cloud-based systems using browser technologies will soon be changing that situation for the better.
To Elitemicro, it’s whatever fulfils the business need best. We have systems running on Linux, Windows and Mac, firewalls running FreeBSD and the large screen in our office for showing critical system alerts running from a Raspberry Pi! Sorry for the tech overload, but you did ask!
When did you move to the estate and whereabouts on the Bowcliffe estate can we find you? Is it an inspiring place to work?
We moved here in February this year and if I’m honest everything during the move and to-date has been a blur. I haven’t sampled as much of outside the office as I should have, but I think it’s an inspiring place to work.
We’re based in the Coach House – come and see us!
Favourite dish on the Drivers’ Club menu?
Duck and Waffle
What are 3 things we don’t know about Lee Read?
- I’m about 5 hours short of the requirements for a private pilot’s license – I have a really keen interest in aviation so it’s probably no surprise that my favourite part of the Estate is the Blackburn Wing.
- I’ve ridden my motorcycle to the most easterly and northerly points of the UK, most westerly point in Ireland and through the deserts of Morocco.
- I have a Class 1 HGV license.
Anything else you want to add?
For those of you interested in Motorsport, a childhood friend and local lad, Lyndon Poskitt, will compete in the Dakar rally for the second time in January 2017 by motorcycle. So if you get the chance, show your support as he takes on the ultra-extreme “Malle Moto” (no support) class of the event.
Share your social media profiles so everyone else on the estate can follow, like and connect with you:
Website: www.elitemicro.co.uk
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/elitemicroltd
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Elitemicroltd