After more than two decades in the industry, Robert King knows a thing or two about web hosting.
The director of Hyperslice Group – the umbrella company behind the popular and Webhosting UK platforms – has a clear focus on customer service which is about to move to a whole new level with the introduction of a fully automated solution for businesses.
Rewinding to the days of Crazy Frog and Nokia mobiles, the then 13-year-old Durham schoolboy built websites offering free ringtones which would eventually lead to the highly-rated business he runs today.
鈥淩ingtones was a way of getting traffic and learning the marketing aspect behind websites,鈥� he recalls to 老九品茶Cloud. 鈥淩unning several websites myself, I then realised I could also probably sell some web hosting to people.聽
鈥淪o I used my birthday money to get a reseller account.鈥�
This awakened an interest in how web servers work and how to keep them secure. As the young King began to make connections in the industry, he said beginning his entrepreneurial journey was not planned out in any way. 鈥淚t just felt right,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 registered eukhost as a limited company when I was 18 and it took off from there.鈥�
Growth
As support requests grew and with them the need for increased resources, he looked first to America then, with more success, India.
鈥淚 located back-end support from Piyush Somani. To this day we don鈥檛 know how I came across his company, but we have been in business ever since that day,鈥� says King. 鈥淗e now owns four data centres, with two in build, and is president of the Indian government鈥檚 cloud initiative.
鈥淲ith his help we became one of the first providers to offer 24/7 live chat support. Even today you can get a live chat from us within 40 seconds鈥� the average is 38 seconds.鈥�
Somani is managing director and CEO of Indian tech giant ESDS.聽
Homer & headwinds
Hyperslice Group was registered as the holding company in 2012 amid an increased demand for enterprise and private infrastructure solutions. The name was inspired by the 鈥楥ompu-Global-Hyper-Mega-Net鈥� parody company founded by none other than Homer Simpson, King reveals with a smile.
The group – which has an average score of 4.9/5 on Trustpilot from almost 6,000 reviews – has always worked well as a name, he says, because people search for 鈥楨U hosting鈥� and 鈥楿K hosting鈥� online.聽
鈥淚 was worried that Brexit would cause us big problems,鈥� he admits. 鈥淏ut while we had a dip, people were willing to stick by us because of our service quality and our stringent data privacy policies. That was a pleasant surprise, to be honest.鈥�
Other market headwinds have been challenging for a business which has never taken on external funding. 鈥淲e are looking to invest 拢5 million over the next three years into building a data centre in the North – and then the energy crisis came around,鈥� he explains.
鈥淲e were land hunting, speaking to estate agents, we had data centre builders lined up – that鈥檚 how close we were. That鈥檚 now on hold鈥� we don鈥檛 want to keep having to pass the cost to our customers.
鈥淎s much as they appreciate us, if we increase our costs too much, they will jump ship. This has always been a competitive industry: some of the larger companies are luring people in with 拢1-a-month deals which then jump to 拢10, 拢20 a month.
鈥淥ut of all of the business challenges I’ve been through, this energy crisis, for our industry, has been one of the worst, if not the worst.鈥�
Hyperslice Group runs an enterprise division from its registered office in Leeds鈥� Platform building, with an enterprise technical team based in York.聽
It uses data centres in Wakefield, Nottingham, Maidenhead and York to serve UK customers including public sector organisations, while it has more than 35,000 customers worldwide and hosts more than 150,000 domains.
Automation
鈥淲e鈥檝e recently launched our Hyperslice platform, which allows our customer base via their portal to perform automated tasks,鈥� says King.
鈥淭hey can start a server, restart a server, rebuild a server, expand a server鈥� basically everything you can do with big tech platforms.聽
鈥淭he difference is that we do it cheaper and you have 24/7 support, which you just don鈥檛 get with big tech platforms.鈥�
Some customers have used the platform over the last six months ahead of the full launch, which King says has been delayed out of necessity during COVID-19.聽
鈥淲e started the project before the pandemic. It is frustrating, of course, but as an established company it allowed us to ensure resources that, with hard work and determination, meant the team have delivered by far the most powerful platform I鈥檝e certainly ever used.鈥�
A dog鈥檚 life
King, who still lives in Durham, lost his beloved rottweilers Ronnie and Reg during the pandemic. 鈥淭hey were 13 and 14 when they died – a good age for my boys,鈥� he says.
Their place has been taken by a youngster: 鈥淎fter the end of lockdown, it just didn鈥檛 feel like a home anymore for us, so I got Lenny.聽
鈥淭hey are just beautiful, amazing dogs. They are misunderstood a lot of time because it’s down to how you bring them up and how you train them.聽
鈥淎lthough to be fair, I鈥檇 forgotten how hard it is at the beginning!鈥�
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