Member Article

Senior hire for Leeds tech firm with eyes on £100m turnover

Transformational technology specialist CloudCoCo Group PLC has appointed a new head of cloud and innovation — Lee Thatcher — as the Leeds-headquartered business eyes an ambitious £100m revenue target.

He joins the firm with nearly 20 years’ tech experience — eight in senior cloud positions, most recently at Tieva (formerly Optm and the pure technology group).

With 140 employees and over 1,000 customers throughout the country — typically organisations with 25-1500 employees — CloudCoCo is currently a £25m revenue IT services and communication company, specialising in network connectivity, cloud, collaboration tech and cyber.

But Lee’s appointment — in the month that marks the group’s fifth anniversary — also signals CloudCoCo’s evolution into a multi-cloud player. This means that, having long been a Microsoft Gold Partner, the company is now cloud agnostic — one of many transitions that opens up a wealth of growth potential for the established brand.

CloudCoCo’s core network seamlessly connects over 35 of the industry’s main data centres. This stepchange — to now put that network at the heart of multi-cloud transformations — has also been fuelled by two new industry collaborations. An exclusive partnership has been agreed with large-scale digital innovation specialist Abstract Tech, similarly based in Leeds, plus CloudCoco has also entered into a strategic agreement with Ingram Micro UK for the supply of Microsoft Azure and other cloud services. Under the agreement CloudCoCo will migrate its cloud business to Ingram Micro Cloud Marketplace to offer leading-edge vendor cloud solutions, such as Microsoft Azure, AWS and Google GCP.

The hunt is also on for another five people to join CloudCoCo’s own team.

“Our strapline as a business has always been — the future starts now,” said founder and CEO Mark Halpin. “Our foresight means we break new boundaries with tech, but our people ensure that this tech makes a difference — that it is successfully adopted, and adds real value inside our clients’ organisations, as they navigate their cloud journey. This sounds like it should be a given in our market, but sadly it isn’t. Businesses are still often squeezed into using a solution that mirrors a vendor’s chosen tech stack, rather than them receiving what they truly need.

“So as we push ahead on our next chapter of growth, it’s important we become truly cloud agnostic. That’s how we’ll unlock the productivity, security, configurability, and efficiency benefits UK businesses are so hungry for — not to mention the free funding that is so often available for customers’ migration projects.”

“I am delighted with Lee’s appointment,” Mark continued. “And the partnership with Abstract means we’ll have the technical means and resource to compete with some of the biggest players in our space, enabling us to secure larger and longer deals with complex, multi-site organisations across the UK. Beyond the potential commercial benefits of the collaboration, there are remarkable cultural synergies at play and, as two Yorkshire-based businesses, I am hopeful we’ll drive further innovation and job creation in the region.”

Lee added: “The marketplace is crowded, but rarely do you find a managed service provider (MSP) that is a true multi-cloud player. We’re one step ahead now, when it comes to the strength of our offering and the pace with which we can transform UK businesses — within our existing customer base, let alone in the wider space.

“Put simply, we’re a cloud overlay specialist — a team of people who can have ultra technical and commercial conversations for businesses that want to hyperscale. Whenever there is a shortfall now, between the tech that an organisation already has, and the tech that they need to thrive, we can deliver it, in a way that makes sense for customers and, importantly, works.”

Since its inception, CloudCoCo has grown organically and by acquisition, having reversed intoAdept4 plc in 2019 and acquired More Computers, IDE Connect and Systems Assurance into the organisation. The company is headquartered in Leeds, with regional offices in Sheffield, Warrington and Bournemouth.

CloudCoCo was also the platinum sponsor at the inaugural Silicon Yorkshire Expo, held at the Everyman cinema in Leeds on 19th April.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Katie Mallinson .