01732 759725 NEWS : RESELLERS 10 Cyber-Duck supports ambitious growth plans with office revamp Hertfordshire-based digital transformation agency Cyber-Duck has purchased the Elstree property that has served as its rented headquarters for more than a decade with the help of a £950,000 funding package from Santander UK. It now plans to restore the Grade 2-listed property – an old coach house on Watling Street, the Roman road running between Marble Arch and St Albans – and refurbish its interior to provide a hybrid working environment designed to foster collaboration, productivity, social interaction and staff wellbeing in support of the company’s ambitious growth plans. These include a 15% annual increase in headcount, from a base of 87 today (in the UK and overseas); the opening of an additional office in central London later this year and an office in Porto, Portugal in 2023; and expansion to the US by 2025. Cyber-Duck, started by Founder and CEO Danny Bluestone in his Mill Hill flat in 2005, has enjoyed rapid growth in recent years as organisation like Cancer Research Technology, Mitsubishi Electric, The Commonwealth, Sport England and the European Commission have drawn on its expertise in user experience (UX), service design, web development and DevOps to make the information they hold easier and quicker for people to access. Cyber-Duck increased turnover from £3.2m in 2019 to £6.7m in 2021 and is forecast to surpass £7.5m this year. www.cyber-duck.co.uk/ Digitopia launches world first Metaverse Readiness Index London-headquartered digital maturity consultancy Digitopia has launched the world’s first Metaverse Readiness Index (MRI) to enable businesses to accurately measure and benchmark their preparedness for the metaverse – a digital twin of the real world, where people can do everything they do today i.e. go to work, socialise, shop and access entertainment. The Metaverse Readiness Index measures six dimensions (ambition, use cases, capabilities, technology, culture and governance) and awards five levels of readiness, from Complacent to Fluid. Halil Aksu, CEO and Co-Founder of Digitopia, said: “The metaverse is coming. It is a highly exciting proposition and we are already seeing a growing appetite for early adoption. The most forward-thinking and innovative businesses are already considering how they can leverage the virtual world and create an early advantage over their competitors. The Metaverse Readiness Index will show businesses exactly how they can get to where they need to be in preparation for the metaverse. They will be able to benchmark their progress against competitors and regularly track their performance.” https://digitopia.co Riverlite acquired by Xperience Cloud and IT services, ERP and CRM provider Xperience has acquired Riverlite, an East of England provider of cloud, cyber security and IT managed services. Hot on the heels of the acquisition of Bury St Edmunds-based Green Duck in October 2021, the Riverlite acquisition increases Xperience’s headcount to 150 (a rise of 42% in 12 months), expands its customer base to 1,150 clients across the UK and Ireland and increases annual turnover to approximately £21.5 million. Xperience CEO Iain O’Kane said: “Growth across the UK remains a strategic priority, and Riverlite is a natural fit as we share a similar culture and values. Importantly, it achieves a leading presence in the East of England and strengthens our existing team nationally. It also provides another Cyber Security and data platform, which given the events of last year and continued global threats is a genuine benefit for our clients.” North Wales IT business embraces employee ownership North Wales-based IT support services specialist Pro-Networks has become an entirely employee-owned business, following the retirement of Managing Director Paul Crudge who founded the company more than 20 years ago. Any member of the Deeside company’s 35-strong workforce who has worked there for at least 12 months becomes a beneficiary of an Employee-Owned Trust (EOT), which holds shares on employees’ behalf as long as they remain an employee of the company. New CEO Geoff Coote said: “By gifting his shares in Pro-Networks to the EOT for the ultimate benefit of our employees, Paul has ensured his positive and long-lasting legacy. Each and every one of our valued employees has a genuinely vested interest in continuing to serve our customers to the very best of their ability. We are very excited for what lies ahead.” www.pro-networks.co.uk The Pro-Networks senior management team: Simon Gainey (sales manager), Leanne Tutill (financial controller), Ian Traynor (non-executive director), Geoff Coote (chief executive officer), Stephen Blank (chair), Zig Kruschke (support manager) & Carl Jarvis (customer service and marketing manager). l to r: Paul Oggelsby, Managing Director of Riverlite; Iain O’Kane, CEO, Xperience; and Rod Jackson, Cloud and IT Services Director, Xperience Vectra honours top UK partners Threat detection and response company Vectra AI has honoured four UK partners in its 2021 ‘Partner of the Year’ awards. They are Computacenter – Newcomer Partner of the Year 2021; Orange Cyberdefense – MSSP Partner of the Year 2021; Core To Cloud – Public Sector Partner of the Year 2021; and NTT Security – Enterprise Partner of the Year 2021.
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