The statement “Your Business is only as Strong as your Network” features prominently on the PacketFabric website. While we may be coming from slightly different angles, for Silicon Yorkshire, the philosophy behind connections delivering the greatest benefits to the largest audience remains the same.
We caught up with Peter Lavington, Director of Sales EMEA for PacketFabric, to hear more about the business, why it wants to get involved with Silicon Yorkshire and what he took from the recent Business Lunch.
The only NaaS platform enabling Edge to Everywhere
Peter comments: “As a global leader in Network as a Service (NaaS), we recently announced our intention to merge with Unitas Global. This will mean that subject to regulatory approval, we can take our industry leading platform & provide greater reach for our customers”.
“In practice, our agile connectivity will allow enterprises to move at the speed of the cloud, digitally transform their businesses, and deliver superior digital experiences to their customers. There is no other NaaS platform enabling true Edge to Everywhere, which makes us unique in the market.
“We are the only provider that has a solution for both last mile and middle mile. As such, customers can connect data centres, offices and branch offices to our network and therefore to any cloud, better enabling their digital journey.”
Becoming an enabler to Yorkshire Businesses
Being a US business, but with an established presence in the UK Peter explains what attracted PacketFabric to Silicon Yorkshire as recent sponsor of the Business Lunch.
He comments: “I was initially introduced to Silicon Yorkshire through one of our partners. They mentioned the group and how it has plans to become the leading tech community in the North. As a business, we want to make connections within the North and this was an opportunity to do that.
“Silicon Yorkshire is a big start-up hub in the North and is becoming the capital for tech. We can see how it is growing and want to become a part of that and the community that supports it. As a business, we want to be an enabler for Yorkshire businesses, but there is an education piece to do first.
“Becoming a sponsor of the Business Lunch gave us the platform to raise our profile and also to become a more prominent voice within the tech community. We were able to share the problems that PacketFabric can solve and to provide further education around cloud, cloud connectivity and how customers can use cloud networking.
“Ultimately, my objective was to make sure that businesses were aware of what is out there and how they can be using it more effectively. I know that companies in the North may be cut off from the kind of service that we provide, but through education and engagement, we can build out our offering to ensure that we have what these organisations need.
“Rather than everything focusing on the South, we want to make our services are relevant to the businesses we engage with in the North too.”
Forging real connections that hold value
This is the first Silicon Yorkshire event that PacketFabric has sponsored, and we wanted to better understand what made the group so appealing.
He comments: “Unlike most traditional networking groups that encourage a ‘sales pitch’, Silicon Yorkshire was different.
“Given the group and its platform has not been developed with the specific intention to sell, people approach the events with an open mind and a genuine keenness to discuss the industry topics that matter most.
“As a vendor it puts you in a relaxed state and it feels like you are talking to a closed community, as opposed to someone you don’t know. As a result, the conversations are starting from a point of trust which is incredibly important if we are to forge real connections that hold value & do business together”
A growing, active and thriving community
Yorkshire has become a hub for IT, digital and technology-based enterprises and we wanted to hear more from Peter about his thoughts on the region and its tech scene.
Peter comments: “The tech community in Yorkshire is growing, active and thriving. From what I can see, it is a great space to tap into tech talent, knowledge and expertise. Businesses should be capitalizing on this and joining Silicon Yorkshire to expand their own networks and give them access to the people that will support their company on its journey.
“It doesn’t matter what size of business you have, start-up or scale-up. Take the Business Lunch as just one example. I went along as a sponsor, but fundamentally my experience and access to people in the room was the same as anyone else.
“As a result of that one event, I made some good connections in the industry, built my partnership network and started preliminary discussions about a project to work with a global customer”.
Sharing advice and the next big thing…
Before we say goodbye to Peter, we take one last opportunity to ask him what one piece of advice he could give to a tech start-up, and what he believes is the next big thing within the tech industry.
Peter concludes: “The one piece of advice I would give to a start-up would be to know your customer. Know who you are targeting and understand their pain points and the problems that you can solve for them.
“In terms of the next big thing, it has to be AI. Ultimately, I’m a technologist and I see AI as a force for good. There is no doubt that it will change things significantly, and already is, but we need to take the benefits from that in order to evolve and to become more efficient.”
We would like to thank PacketFabric for their support. For further information about the business and what it delivers for its global network of tech customers, please visit: https://packetfabric.com/
