Member Article

IT experts help Darlington apprentices onto career ladder

North East IT company, Razorblue, has started a period of recruitment by taking on three local apprentices.

Now in its tenth year, the business, headquartered in Catterick, underwent a management restructure in 2015 appointing new directors and recruiting new staff as it secured a range of large scale contracts, increasing its team from 25 to 37. The business plans to create more new jobs this year to assist with its growth plans and its new office base in London.

The three new apprentices are all on IT apprenticeships from Baltic Training in Newton Aycliffe and are working on Razorblue’s service desk dealing with technical issues and providing customer support.

Twenty one year old Daniel Gustard, from Darlington, and Ryan Woodhead, 20 from Catterick, are both working towards an NVQ level 4 IT qualification after successfully completing level 3, while 19 year old Kieran Dunn, from Darlington, is working towards his level 3.

Sonny Rockett, customer relations manager from Baltic Training in Newton Aycliffe, said: “Razorblue is a fantastic business to work with. They offer structure, support, strong communication and, by the output in terms of commercial growth, their vision to work and support young people in the workplace clearly pays off. The team at Razorblue is always willing to invest its time and effort to see that apprentices become full time employees and they reward their loyalty with great opportunities to grow and learn. We look forward to working with them again in the future.”

Managing director of Razorblue Group, Dan Kitchen, said: “Our three new apprentices are proving a real asset to Razorblue and are an essential addition to our team. Many of our staff have been with us since our inception which is quite rare in this industry but shows our commitment to development and ongoing promotion.”

“We’ve now got some ambitious plans in place for ongoing growth and investment to offer a level of service and price point which constantly outperforms our competitors. Recruiting the best team and encouraging young people into this sector is very much part of that.

At the start of 2016, Razorblue received global recognition for its quality management systems meeting the strict criteria to achieve ISO9001 certification, an internationally recognised industry standard for quality management.

In addition to the new London base, in the City, Razorblue also has an office in Leeds at Airport West Business Park in Yeadon, close to Leeds Bradford Airport.

The company, whose HQ is at Colburn Business Park in Catterick, specialises in managed IT services, cloud, connectivity and business systems for a wide range of SMEs, business parks and public sector organisations across the UK.

In the last half of 2015, Razorblue saw contract revenue grow by around 40% and expects to sustain similar levels of growth this year.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Anna Addison Associates .