A subtle pivot in the 2015 financial year pumped up the fortunes of MIT Services Group. “We changed strategy slightly in our approach to customers, going from a historical managed services business, to more outsourcing, we call it,” says MIT general manager Brendon Major. It helped the company surge 131.8 percent to reach revenues of $2.4 million.
The outsourced offering has enjoyed great popularity with schools in MIT’s home city of Canberra. “The education sector has been our big one this year. We outsource to schools and have full-time staff on site. We manage their IT from top to toe like you would a government department. The schools have loved it. They think it’s great.”
The ‘outsourcing’ move has coincided with an increasing inability for education institutions to hold onto talented in-house IT staff, says Major. “Especially in Canberra, we’ve got two sorts of IT managers in education. There are the ones who have been there for 20-odd years and are very good at their job. [But] the new ones that are coming through are averaging six to 12 months in a school before they want to move on to something bigger and better. [Those schools are] the ones that we’re picking up. We manage that for them. We put our staff on-site. We make sure they’re trained. We have a secondary staff member trained on every site so if they’re sick, we back-fill.”
As word of its success has spread, the Fyshwick service provider has noticed a curious role reversal. “In August last year, maybe October, vendors were approaching us saying ‘We want you to do our product’ – as opposed to us chasing after them and going ‘I need to sell your product’,” says Major. “I thought that was a really nice change to hear that.”
MIT’s tremendous growth has also seen potential buyers circle, with Major recalling three different approaches in recent times. “One offer was tempting but being in the position I’m in at the moment, I’m allowed to overprice.”
The next potential move for MIT is to open a Brisbane office, with an existing customer having remote sites in Queensland that are currently looked after by a subcontractor. “Brisbane has been one of the [locations] we’ve struggled to really find a reliable person on the ground. But an ex-employee of mine has moved to Brisbane and is now looking for a role. This might be our opportunity to open the Brisbane office. I would love to open a Sydney and a Melbourne one, but it’s so cut-throat in those places.”
Major says the Canberra market is in good shape, and its customers appreciate doing business with a local provider. “A lot of people have really tried hard to break into the Canberra market. Historically, a lot of Sydney firms have tried. The issues they face is that they try and do a lot out of Sydney. It never works.”
FACT FILE
- Founded 2009
- Key executive Brendon Major
- HQ Fyshwick, ACT
- Growth 131.8%
- 2015 revenue $2.4 million
- Headcount 12 (at time of entry)
- Top vendors Dell, Acer, Xirrus
- Top distributors Bluechip Infotech, Ingram Micro, Dicker Data
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