The Business Exchange Bath & Somerset Issue 13: Autumn 2019 | Page 30

TECHNOLOGY Mintivo urges SMEs not to underestimate the importance of IT strategy Mintivo, the Chippenham-based IT provider which delivers corporate IT services to SMEs, is asking them the question – “what is important to you?” Working with a wide range of businesses and organisations in the UK and abroad, the company has found that often staff, family, productivity and business growth tend to be high on the list of important considerations - but rarely IT. Mintivo says that IT infrastructure is usually the lifeblood of an organisation, where any downtime or computer glitches cost time and money. Company owners and staff need and expect immediate resolutions to issues and set extremely tight turnaround times in order for businesses to continue operating. It is therefore important to partner with an IT support provider who can deliver such service, but also one who has a wealth of experience in infrastructure design, implementation and management. In addition, IT Support needs to cover all aspects of business- critical computing which includes servers, storage, networking, connectivity, security and software. According to Mintivo, it is good practice to regularly review your plans for the future as your business evolves. Together with your IT support provider, it is vital to identify likely IT challenges, requirements and also identify the benefits that different IT solutions can provide to enable your business to succeed in its ambitions. Once you understand what you need, sourcing the right hardware and configuring it in a way that will best meet your unique business requirements is also essential. Mintivo believes that having a robust, progressive IT strategy should be included within the list of what is important to you. Reliability, security and the speed of IT systems is now pivotal to the ongoing success of most organisations. Steve Healy, Managing Director for Mintivo, explained, “Companies get to around 20 plus staff and often find that they have complex IT needs which they struggle to manage for themselves. Mintivo provides consultancy and road mapping sessions to truly understand each customer’s business.” The support team at Mintivo works to the ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) framework designed to standardise the selection, planning, delivery and maintenance of IT services within a business. In addition, they are Cyber Essentials certified, Advanced VoIP telephone specialists, Microsoft certified, VMware certified professionals and have several other Project Management, Customer Service, Technical and Sales software qualifications and accreditations. Mark Adams, Operations Director for Mintivo, said, “Our team is employed for their customer service skills in addition to their technical abilities. We believe that it is imperative for us to be able to explain highly technical solutions in a simple to understand way for those that don’t have the technical backgrounds that we do.” Chris Gough, Technical Director “IT Support needs to cover all aspects of business-critical computing which includes servers, storage, networking, connectivity, security and software” @mintivo Connected. Secure. IT Support Mintivo is a leading IT provider helping ambitious organisations by delivering corporate IT services to the SME Proud to be working with companies throughout the UK and Europe Managed IT Support Cyber Security Microsoft Cloud 03333 580 348 I www.mintivo.co.uk I [email protected] 30 THE BUSINESS EXCHANGE 2019