Monday Interview: Leeds tech startup is on its way to becoming a heavyweight

IT and automation business Dynamic Networks only launched last year but already the business is growing its team with a recruitment drive.

The business was set up in August 2015 by former Blue Logic director James Baird and non-executive director Matthew Briggs, chief executive of The Law Superstore online platform, and is now based at newly-sold Airedale House on Kirkstall Road.

Managing director of the firm, Mr Baird is taking on three new staff and developing an in-house academy to ensure staff are multi skilled, as plans to grow gather pace.

“Call centres are impersonal, you never speak to the same person. It also helps staff, they get variety and to get out and see clients,” he said.

This attitude is unsurprising as Mr Baird started out his working life in customer service, working in hospitality at front of house.

“My background feeds into business these days, we are open to how people perceive us as a company because of it,” he said.

A spell at Yorkshire Building Society saw Mr Baird set up the organisation’s call centre, helping to build it to more than 100 people before transferring to corporate to work on bespoke accounts.

But Mr Baird isn’t one to stand still. He had achieved success at YBS relatively young and wanted to see something of the world. He took two years out travelling around the world, visiting Singapore and Thailand as well as Australia, with spells in Sydney and the Gold Coast.

Buying a $400 car, he travelled around the country, working at Bondi Beach to the sound of the B side of a Fleetwood Mac 8-track.

“Something was missing at YBS. So when I came back from travelling with nothing to lose, I decided to retrain as an electrician like my grandfather,” said Mr Baird.

Little did he know that this decision would start him on a path that led him to Dynamic Networks.

“It was the first time I thought: I can have my own business.”

Following this he had a stint as director at digital marketing business Blue Logic, where he was given a taste of working in the digital and technology sector proper. The business was founded in 2007 as an IT support and network services provider, and now employs £5.8m turnover firm with 66 staff. .

After 7 years of “hard slog” said Mr Baird, he managed to complete a buyout.

He said; “I used to hate plans, and have always been bursting with ideas. Thankfully people like Matthew [Briggs] bring structure. We have monthly strategy meetings right now because quarterly ones are just not feasible.

“I wouldn’t be where I am without the people I work with.”

Despite a solid management team at Dynamic Networks, not everything always goes to plan. Happily for Dynamic Networks this has not been a bad thing at all.

“Truthfully we didn’t envision that the IT division would take off like it has,” said Mr Baird.

Covering IT, security, automation, networks and cabling are their main areas, the firm has just won a £64m-turnover client, and home automation is Dynamic Networks’ other big area of growth, according to Mr Baird. It is already 30% ahead in terms of growth that the original business plan predicted.

The LEP are helping fund a full automation demo room for the business, so they can show customers what they can do.

“The lines are blurring between business and home automation,” said Mr Baird.”People want to have everything integrated.”

The focus on the IT and ‘back end’ is a marked departure from the angle security firms take.

Everything from heating and energy consumption can be monitored, as well as regulating the temperature of your bubble bath, seeing phone camera footage of parcels being delivered and getting the kettle boiled before you even get out of bed.

With his high level of automation, it is unsurprised that individuals and businesses are starting to concern themselves more and more with security, which is something Dynamic Networks has growing expertise in.

Old firewalls, weak password and out-of-date software can increase the likelihood of a security breach.

“Companies think IT is a one-off investment, but is constantly evolving, and so are we.”