Office Space News
Avanta Partners with ThinkGrid for Low-Cost Serviced Office IT
Published October 28th, 2009 by Jennifer LeClaire
Regus isn’t the only serviced office giant forging strategic alliances. Avanta Managed Offices has inked a deal with ThinkGrid that aims to help businesses moving into serviced office space avoid a large capital investment in IT hardware and software.
ThinkGrid offers hosted business IT services from the cloud on an on-demand basis. That means businesses don’t have to make large up front investments in PCs, servers and supporting software licenses, or dedicate time and resource to managing IT. Customers only pay for what they use on a monthly rolling contract, they are also free to scale the number of users up and down, as well as adding and removing applications.
“Avanta serviced office centers are known for providing outstanding levels of customer service, and this new deal with ThinkGrid extends those levels even further,” says Geraint Evans, Avanta’s sales and marketing director. “Our business service package already includes 4 or 8Mb resilient Internet access and together with telecoms services, the deal with ThinkGrid now completes the menu of services available to Avanta customers.
Thanks to the ThinkGrid alliance, new Avanta customers can immediately begin to use low-cost PCs called thin clients, familiar desktop software and applications such as Microsoft Windows and Office as well as file servers for saving data. Alternatively, established businesses relocating to Avanta can continue to use their existing PCs to access ThinkGrid’s services and then switch to thin clients when these older machines need replacing.
“In the current economic climate, most SMEs and small businesses need to channel their management resources on their core business without worrying about the cost, availability and security of their IT systems,” Evans says. “So, by linking up with ThinkGrid we have taken a significant step towards minimizing customer IT issues by providing them with a cost-effective solution that will provide them with real peace of mind.”
ThinkGrid’s services are built on the same type of IT infrastructure that corporate businesses and banks use, and can be accessed via a standard Internet connection anywhere in the world. This means that employees on the move or working from home can benefit from the same level of IT as those at Avanta’s 19 serviced office centers in London , Manchester, the Thames Valley and Edinburgh.
”Avanta has built a strong reputation around delivering high-quality, flexible serviced office space that offer customers everything they need to start operating from day one. We are therefore extremely pleased to be partnering with them to offer no fuss, flexible IT that is ready to go the minute customers move in,” says Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid. “Thousands of our SME customers across the UK are already seeing the value of our business IT on-demand services, which remove all the pain and leave only the benefits of IT, so that they can focus on what they do best.”
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Marcus Hester October 28th, 2009 at 8:39 am
This cloud computing movement is the wave of the future. I think Avanta is smart to form an alliance with ThinkGrid. This is very attractive to serviced office users overall. I am not sure what kind of a discount Avanta customers might get for using ThinkGrid as part of their executive suite package as opposed to going to the company directly, but in any case it raises awareness of a much-needed technology solution for many small businesses.
Melanie Jones October 28th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
This just goes to show you how important technology is to offices today. Serviced office facilities have an opportunity to get on the cutting-edge at a low cost through hosted technology solutions like the one from ThinkGrid. This could be yet another competitive advantage for the executive suites industry if it’s adopted widely.
Elizabeth Sanchez October 29th, 2009 at 6:45 am
I think the concept of thin clients is probably foreign to most small business owners. This is a great opportunity for ThinkGrid because it introduced serviced office clients to an emerging realm of web-based IT solutions. Even if they grow out of their executive suite they will still have an affinity for the ThinkGrid model. So this really is a smart move for the tech firm.
Bill Brookshire October 29th, 2009 at 7:23 am
Do any serviced office companies in the U.S. offer IT solutions like this? I would think alliances in this area of hosted tech stuff is the way to go. This gets the burden off the executive suites company to provide some of this technology while also offering an affordable option to small businesses.