Member Article

Bdaily talks to SR1 IT Solutions

Bdaily talks with Michael and Adrian McCarrol, directors of SR1 IT Solutions, offering complete no nonsense IT support for organisations.

What key challenges has your company faced recently?

Michael: One of our big challenges has been to get the Grid Beacon system off the ground, fully working and fully tested. Well, more recently we had an organization come to us last week, looking for us to get their IT systems and infrastructure set up. They need to fully modernize the systems and we worked non stop to ensure that we covered every element and help them future proof for the next 10 years, its about taking them to the forefront of cutting edge technology.

In the last 12 months what do you feel is the biggest achievement for the company?

Adrian: Definitely, Grid Beacon. Thats our new beacon of joy. The system has been in the making for a few months and now its ready and in use by a number of our clients. We believe it can change the way people use IT within the business.

So what exactly is Grid Beacon and what sparked the idea for the system?

Michael: The initial concept came about as part of our transparency promise. It was an add-on to open up and remove the boundaries between supplier and customer. Enabling customers to gain an understanding of how their systems are working. Theres full accountability, the client can look and see that were doing our job and that the systems are being maintained.

Adrian: As it is a complete monitoring system it enables the end user to comprehensively monitor every element of their IT infrastructure. Knowing its full potential we could see that it could work independently as a product that helps other IT departments, within large companies, councils, government agencies, anywhere with a large number of IT assets, preferably over a large area. As the system can be set up to manage multiple locations simultaneously an organization can increase productivity and more importantly increase system up time.

Grid Beacon enables this as it gives you plenty of warning, however, one of the brilliant things about the Grid Beacon system is that it can automatically fix issues so you dont even need an engineer to go out to site sometimes.

Michael: Grid Beacon will see a problem, fix it, and report it back to the engineers letting them know that its been resolved.

So would you say that this is where the IT within the business is heading?

Michael: Definitely, even more so as we move towards cloud and virtualization. Having an overall picture of how every little thing on your IT estate is running at that particular moment in real-time is far more effective, as you know when you’re heading towards a failure and nip it in the bud before it becomes an issue. Therefore, reducing the risk of down time and increasing satisfaction in users.

What is your focus for the coming year?

Adrian: Working further on Grid Beacon. We are already working on an artificial intelligence model. There are also developments for the system to work with mobile technology like smartphones and tablets. So that in the near future it will cover every element of technology.

Michael: So for instance, lets say youve forgotten if you left your tablet in the office or on the train. All you do is ring up your help desk, and they can track down the location of the tablet.

Adrian: In addition to this the security side of it will look to manage your systems and stop hackers or viruses getting near the systems in the first place. Its going to be a complete management suite.

If you had to choose one piece of advice for someone just starting out in business, or is currently operating within your industry sector, what would it be?

Adrian & Michael: Never give up.

Michael: Its tough at times, it feels very lonely at the beginning, but things will start falling together, its quite magical. It may seem like a lot of thankless hours at first but stick at it and keep going.

Can you share your view of the current landscape of the business within the region and where does SR1 IT Solutions fit into it?

Michael: Were very much at the heart of it because of Sunderland Software City. They are leading the region in getting the North East as a whole focused on technology and getting high quality technology set up in the area.

More importantly, keeping them in the area, so the idea is that the North East will become a hub for technology in the country and even internationally.

Adrian: The changes can already be seen; the next five years will be a pivotal point in the growth.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Iraa Kadchha .