The Ringwood based IT Software Solutions company, KFA Connect has experienced a 65% rise in enquiries in the last year for their team to examine IT systems that are now perceived as slow or outdated by businesses in the region.
KFA Connect Director, Richard Austin said that many of the enquiries are from company bosses who have held off updating and enhancing systems that were designed a decade or two ago and now do not maximise the efficiency and productivity of their business.
“Often it is only when an organisation employs someone new with the task of managing their IT that the fact that an outdated system is costing them time, money and customer satisfaction, even new business sales, do the people at the top realise the situation needs to change” said Richard Austin.
60% of KFA Connect’s £2.5m turnover is generated from IT product testing and evaluation, with design and consultancy also contributing to the figure. Team members are assigned to follow the way a system integrates, including areas in the customer’s business – such as sales, accounts, logistics, manufacturing and procurement. The future demands the business will face are also considered.
“We are always looking to ensure that any solution we propose to a customer is scalable and will grow with the business. The whole purpose of an IT system is to make running a business as easy and financially efficient as possible. Sometimes we spot bolted on packages that hinder the communication flow between people and department, making manual effort commonplace and errors far more frequent. Company Directors love what we do as it offers greater visibility, can positively improve sales and decrease ongoing overheads.”
A good example the team have recently encountered with one enquiry was the introduction of a new E-commerce solution for taking orders and not integrating with their ordering system. This led to manual data entry of orders in the back-end systems, resulting in errors being keyed and delays to customer orders.
KFA Connect has increased its team from 22 to 28 in the past 12 months to meet demand from a variety of national and regional clients.
For further information visit www.kfa.co.uk