We ’ re big enough to deliver and provide great service but small enough to care .
IT
Founders – Tom Roberton ( left ) and Michael Povey launched Circle Cloud 12 years ago .
Leadership team – directors Tom Roberton ( right ) and Michael Povey ( centre ) with former Onyx CEO Neil Stephenson , Circle Cloud ’ s chairman .
We ’ re big enough to deliver and provide great service but small enough to care .
stranger to building a successful IT firm on Teesside .
Neil Stephenson is the former CEO of Onyx Group , which flourished in the late 1990s and early 2000s before being acquired in a multi-million pound deal .
Describing himself as “ a Geordie who knows the Tees Valley market pretty well ”, Neil ’ s experience and expertise is now helping Circle Cloud consolidate and enhance the reputation it ’ s built since 2013 .
He said : “ You don ’ t last in business for 12 years in a hugely competitive market without having a great reputation , and customer satisfaction is off the scale with this business – I ’ ve never worked in a business where the customers love it so much .
“ You get firms who grow really big and then get rid of their lower-end customers . They don ’ t care anymore . But that ’ s not the Circle Cloud approach .
“ This business has focused on a certain set of geographies and customers who find a natural home in a firm like this .”
Coming from someone so experienced , that ’ s music to the ears of Tom , Michael and the team – and just fuels their determination not to rest on their laurels .
Circle Cloud ’ s average customer has 25-50 IT users , but operating within the SME range , they can also help start-ups
through to those with 100-plus . SMEs will always remain its key market , and for good reason .
Tom explained : “ What makes SMEs unappealing to a lot of IT firms is , to start with , making bespoke packages can be a lot of work for not a lot of reward .
“ However , our service is a robust , repeatable model that we can put in and guarantee a quality of service out of it .
“ We are focused on bringing everything an SME needs in a package to them . And we want to grow by having more of them , rather than just having bigger customers .” Commercial director Michael added : “ The smaller end of our customer base will never become a low priority because our offering and support is always going to be geared towards them .
“ It ’ s also a strong business model for us because we don ’ t have all our eggs in one basket in terms of one or two large customers .”
A cyber security audit and a Microsoft Cloud cost analysis are free services offered at the start of a relationship with Circle Cloud .
Indeed , one recent consumption audit saved a local business around £ 50,000 .
And after that ? It ’ s all about providing a reliable , cyber-secure , value-for-money service .
Tom said : “ We provide daily IT support and first-class customer service – ring up with an issue and our guys are straight on it . That comes with cyber security built in as standard – we bundle in the different components an SME needs from a cyber security point of view into their package , rather than them having to go out and hunt for these different pieces .”
And as chairman Neil looks at Circle Cloud ’ s future , he ’ s extremely optimistic .
He said : “ The Tees Valley has a good ecosystem of tech businesses and we fit right in the middle of that ecosystem .
“ We ’ re big enough to deliver and provide great service but small enough to care .
“ And people like to buy local – when they ring the service desk and hear a local voice , they ’ ll like it , and I think that ’ s important .”
Visit circlecloud . co . uk
The voice of business in the Tees region | 47