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Comment by Michael Lounton
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"As a company, we have achieved so much this year with more planned for next year. If I don’t write this article now, it will end up being twice as long in three months time. I apologise for the bullet point style but there’s a great deal of information to impart. I hope you find it informative.
As you will read in this newsletter, PSU IT Voice and Data will be re-branding its customer facing activities at the end of the year and as part of this change, will become the PSU Technology Group. The directors believe that this change will better reflect our product and service offering.
PSU Talk will also benefit from the new corporate style. The timing is opportune as we are in the process of launching our long awaited wholesale line rental business. In addition to offering significant call savings on business calls, online spend analysis and non-geographic numbering, we’ll also be able to provision lines and network links on the same bill. Our support teams now benefit from a direct link into BT which will assist in improving our network fault resolution times and decrease the delay in having lines installed.
Our server and IT network support / maintenance business continues to be awarded significant contracts as companies and organisations recognise that PSU represents not just a “safe pair of hands”, but also a financially beneficial alternate to direct manufacturers such as Sun, Bull, IBM, Dell and HP.
2006 has seen a significant growth in the products and services that we offer. This has subsequently resulted in our people embracing new skills or the company acquiring new skills from outside. Technology is converging as fast as the skills required to implement them overlap. Our investment in training increases year on year as IT and voice engineers acquire additional skills; the latest resulting in our appointment as a Citrix Silver Solutions Adviser. The distinction between the engineering teams is becoming blurred as voice becomes another application running across the network requiring engineers with CCNA and CTP skill sets.
April saw the creation of a dedicated convergence team whose brief is to work with the regional business managers and provide project management where calls and data are to be routed over a common network. This team can come into an organisation and simulate expected voice call traffic over the WAN to ensure end to end quality of service. The significant investment in network assessment software, training and personnel is easily justified by the fact that potential clients would not appoint us to provide an IP solution without the comfort factor offered by this service.
A departure from what you might expect is provided by our latest division, PSU Software Ltd. This division has developed a unique Website Content Management System that provides anyone with a basic understanding of word the ability to create and maintain their online business. Developed using the latest Microsoft .Net technologies, ‘Beyond Content Management’ is delivered using the ‘Software as a Solution’ model hence nullifying the need to buy-in expensive software or training. The site is designed to your brief by our in-house graphic designers then hosted on our servers. You can then logon via a browser and start building your site. Web 2.0 is driving collaborative working and online applications; Beyond Content Management provides you with the tools to create a content rich online presence for your business, without the need for expensive web designers or software developers.
We have used this software to develop our latest website dedicated to the range of Inter-Tel telephone systems, www.intertel-systems.co.uk, and will use it to re-brand our existing websites www.psu.uk.com and www.psucomputers.co.uk into the new design.
Like any successful business, constant procedural reviews must be carried out to ensure that bureaucracy is kept to a minimum whilst still retaining a professional service. Anything that speeds up these processes should be welcomed and with this in mind we are implementing a back-office software suite to further enhance business control. This software will lie at the heart of the group and empower everyone within our business. We have already completed beta testing and plan the roll out via Citrix by the end of this month to our Southern Office, Regional Business Managers and engineers across the country. Staff can even use the system via their Blackberry’s. You should start to see the benefits of this new system within the coming months.
My apologies for the length of this article, as you can see we have been busy over the past year. On behalf of the directors and staff at PSU, I would like to thank you for your continued business and look forward to working with you over the coming years."
Yours truly,
Michael Lounton
Managing Director
PSU IT Voice and Data Ltd.
