Retrac understands the technology spectrum required to keep The Entire Group delivering for its clients. Entire now has a best practice, evolving ICT environment with its business confidence underpinned by Retrac managed services.
Entire’s ICT environment required a strategic overhaul. The company’s business continuity was at risk from a lack of coordination between the disparate, ageing elements of its platform. And best practice security and backups were needed to protect its data.
The 360 staff of The Entire Group, headquartered in South Melbourne, provide a fully coordinated design and installation service for fire protection, mechanical services, and electrical services to the construction industry across Victoria.
“Retrac’s capabilities are exceptional. We’ve had good quality, large projects that have gone very well – including two significant server upgrades and a new wireless network system. Things have always run smoothly off the back of Retrac’s top-notch planning.”
CHRIS CATO
– HVAC Drafting Manager, Entire
Over the 10 years of the relationship, the two organisations have proactively worked ideas together. Retrac understands the technology spectrum required to keep service organisations like Entire delivering for its clients.
Under Retrac’s expert leadership, Entire has a continually evolving, fit for purpose technology platform. In the trusted hands of Retrac, the broad managed service arrangement encompass connectivity management and deployment, Cloud Office 365 and backup services, and all security monitoring and installations. Its support services also now include a helpdesk for users.
While Entire has not yet committed to a full migration to the Cloud, it does now have all the current principles in place for it to be confident in the security and robustness of its ICT environment. Entire relies on Retrac’s 500 MB fibre internet, so automated backups are completed daily, giving Entire peace of mind.
Firewall security and backups have been a particular focus of recent work. Retrac manages the Windows platform security and advises on the policies which ensure “we stay on top of things”, Chris Cato says.
Entire has regularly reviewed its arrangements with Retrac to ensure “they continue to be the best fit, with the right high-value skillsets we need to complement our internal knowledge and provide a great service to our customers,” Chris Cato says.
“We stick with Retrac because, from our experience, they deliver real, proven systems that are configured correctly. We trust them; they deliver on time and with minimal disruption. We’ve been very happy.”
CHRIS CATO
– HVAC Drafting Manager, Entire
Even after 10 years of partnership the benefits of having Retrac as a strategic IT partner continue:
– Access to best skillset: “The Group has considered, at various times, getting a dedicated network engineer or IT Manager. But to hire someone with the right skillset across all the different aspects of IT we need, we’d be looking at paying over $120k in salary. It just doesn’t make sense when we have access to all those skillsets and more with Retrac, at a significantly smaller annual cost,” explains Chris Cato.
– System resilience: “With Retrac’s guidance and leadership we’ve been able to layout very good engineering infrastructure,“ adds Chris Cato. “For example over the last seven years, we’ve had two large installations, new servers, switches, and firewall gear.” Retrac ensured the systems developed were resilient and planning and implementation went smoothly.
– Time-saving: “Having Retrac on board has been an incredible time saver for the business and me. I can focus on my core role [looking after the Mechanical Services Drafting Team who design and draft HVAC systems] and other high value IT task for the business. I don’t have to be as hands-on any more, I don’t have to do 70 hours a week anymore, Retrac does it for me,” says Chris Cato.
– Correct ICT, strong business, great customer service: “My CAPEX planning, predicting expenditures over 6 months to 5 years, is being done with the right information, from a hardware and software perspective. And our people have the tools they need to develop as a team and to improve our delivery to customers,” says Chris Cato.
The Entire Group continues to invest and develop its ICT infrastructure seeing how IT can help shape and grow their business.“Retrac continues to help and guide our IT investment projects including what we need to support planned enhancements like video conferencing for example.”
Chris Cato advises that to make the best technology selections and investment decisions – that will support your organisation well into the future – you need to find a partner with the right, expert skill set.
“Ours is a strategic partnership. Entire will continue to rely on Retrac to guide its IT investment projects. We want to maximise our use of Retrac’s capabilities – its considerable network planning and engineering skills – to help secure Entire’s future.”
CHRIS CATO
– HVAC Drafting Manager, Entire