Tell me a bit about your company:

At Simplex Services, we are specialists in information technology consulting and implementing technology services across various industries. We help small and medium enterprises transform from traditional models to new age service models and identify new revenue streams.

We partner with companies where we can address immediate skill gaps, develop IT strategies, handle infrastructure requirements, and provide execution support.  In addition to this, we offer free advisory, whereby our experts assess IT health and digital preparedness of your business and highlight potential improvements.

 

How has your company been affected by COVID-19, and how is that situation now?

The COVID-19 phase was obviously a difficult time for us all. It was a tough time and the health and emotional well-being of our customers, partners and associates was our top priority. At the same time, ensuring that our services are not interrupted was a daunting task.

We ensured a smooth transition to working from home for our employees. The transition to the ‘new normal’ was smoother for our employees as we offered flexibility to take care of more pressing needs, financial assistance when required, and any other possible help whenever needed.

The pandemic provided us with an opportunity to work closely on our objectives and connected to goals like digitalisation, technology enablement, and our steadfast attention to meet our clients’ growth. During the epidemic, our main goal was to help our customers who didn’t have the resources to improve their IT infrastructure or develop virtual collaboration capabilities. We engaged on many initiatives to effectively digitise their environment and exceeded expectations.

 

What has been your biggest challenge so far?

 Our biggest challenge so far has been to ensure we continue to have the right set of people in the organisation. Our success is based on the repeat and referral customer base, and it is important for us to ensure customer delight in all circumstances. To enable this, it is very important that our associates have the right technical skills, are ingrained into the company’s culture and can foresee any issues that may require intervention, a combination of which is vital to ensure our customers continue to trust us. This is our biggest challenge.

 

What could someone in another sector learn from how you have approached the challenges you faced during covid?

On the personal front, I am still learning every day. As an organisation, I think some of the following approaches can be tried by people in other sectors:

  • Finding opportunities in crisis. The opportunities should be directly related to the core skills of the organisation, but tailor made for the situations at hand.
  • Hybrid working can actually boost profitability when done in the right way.
  • Maintaining team dynamics can enhance your team’s productivity and eventually help retain and grow your customer base.
  • Using IT to automate and digitise processes helps trigger the process of efficiency and cost optimisation. Start small and identify any process currently being done manually to get the ball rolling.

 

What has been your biggest success to date?

The biggest success is yet to come as the bar is always set high with every achievement. This doesn’t mean we don’t celebrate our success, but implies that we keep pushing ourselves to deliver better than our previous benchmark. One of our key wins has been continuously developing our skills and capabilities to remain relevant in the market, retain and enhance our customer base, and above all, attract and retain talent in the organisation.

 

What are your plans for the future? 

 The sky is the limit, and we are planning towards:

  • Investing in people and becoming an employer of choice.
  • Focusing on small and medium size companies and identifying specific industry segments. For example, asset and wealth management firms.
  • Focusing on productivity enhancement and outcome-based offerings.

 

How are you planning to build this team to scale?

Adapting to the hybrid working model and keeping pace with evolving technology skills are very important for our associates. The pandemic also made us realise the importance of ensuring mental wellbeing. We have plans to make all three as key focus for our existing associates and all new hires. We are focusing on fresh as well as experienced talent to ensure we provide opportunities based on skills and have a right balance of individuals in the organisation.

 

How did you hear about Sussex Innovation, and why did you decide to join Sussex Innovation?

It was through word of mouth, many moons ago! The high-end facilities, high concentration of companies across various industry segments and access to wider academic talent from the University of Sussex made it an obvious choice.

 

What is your favourite thing about Sussex Innovation?

It is very difficult to identify a single favourite. Some of our favourites include the receptiveness and access to Sussex Innovation staff and the talent pool here. Their skills and experience ranges from management, sales, marketing and ability to manage challenges and opportunities faced by start-ups and growing companies.

My favourite remains the allocated space and free electric car charging facility. One more reason to come to the office!