RJ Herbert reports success with K3 Managed Services

IT manager Lawrence Defty explains that K3 started working with his Norfolk-based company when it needed to upgrade its CAD system and ageing Impact Award software, which also meant implementing a more solid, reliable and faster network. "A lot of our legacy equipment was out of warranty and we were running six servers for our software, email and document storage," states Defty. "We needed the support of a company that could deliver a solid operating platform and provide the kind of responsive support that our business demands," he adds. Defty says the K3 Managed Services team scoped the project to provide a robust and scalable migration strategy and IT solution, specifying its Sentinel enterprise wide services support platform to maximise network availability. The firm provided what Defty describes as an optimised network design, replacing the old servers with five new units, with the latest Microsoft Windows operating systems, Microsoft Exchange Server, Syspro ERP and Equator, K3's integrated HR management system. As well as the network infrastructure hardware and business software, K3 also provided backup, remote access and network switch solutions. "When it came to getting the new infrastructure up and running, it was imperative that we experienced the least possible disruption to our working process," comments Defty. "K3 understood this and we only needed half a day's downtime for the entire week of migrating to the new solution. "We view our IT network as mission critical to our business and we've been running on this platform for over a year now with no significant problems arising. The guys at K3 really know Syspro, so bringing them in to upgrade our system and smooth out other areas was the right decision."