BUSINESS IS FLOWING

Dynaflow (www.dynaflow.co.nz) designs and builds hydraulic equipment and its business includes the Hose Doctor mobile service franchises. It has branches in Wellington, Wanganui and Auckland, but it was the distance between the first two cities that was eating up time, and money.Director Scott Clarke was driving from his base in Wellington to Wanganui at least once a week – a journey that takes more than five hours. Then there was the hassle of getting staff from the branches together for meetings, plus meeting with customers. “You’re pretty tired by the time you get back, and really you’re only doing it to be diplomatic, and we place a high emphasis on having those face-to-face meetings rather than just speaking over the telephone,” he says.So when Clarke heard about Cisco’s Communications Makeover competition last year, he decided to enter. The competition is open to businesses with between 20 and 100 employees, who have to explain in 60 words how an IT makeover would enhance their business. Dynaflow won, and scored itself $50,000 worth of new technology (the prize was doubled for this year’s event, with the winner named on June 2nd).Dynaflow now has a very flexible IP telephone system and WebEx, which allows videoconferencing and sharing of documents, and also has a virtual whiteboard for meetings and presentations. Email is also integrated with the telephony. With reduced communications and travel costs, Clarke estimates they’ve realised a 20-30% saving across the board. “If we’d actually invested in the system ourselves we’d have realised a return on investment within 18 to 24 months,” he says.