Innovative Companies | IT Services
Exeter-headquartered information technology services provider Carousel Industries of North America Inc. has 1,300 employees and multiple locations. It helps more than 6,000 businesses across the globe create and maintain innovative IT environments so their people can work quicker and improve productivity.
But its innovative nature, said Jason Viera, the company’s technology officer, has more to do with freedom given to Carousel technologists and the company’s culture overall.
“Innovation – that term is overused,” said Viera. “A lot of what we’ve done is enabled our engineers, given them creative liberties. It’s less about creating innovation and more about enabling technologists … allowing them to use creative solutions rather than making it a specific emphasis.”
On its website Carousel calls Viera the driving force behind its new Office of the CTO program.
“We see it as serving one function: looking around the corner on what’s emergent for our customers,” he said. The mission of the new office is to line up engineering talent with Carousel customers – a kind of white-glove service – to strengthen business outcomes, whether that be for a company’s manufacturing clients or any other niche.
That doesn’t mean automatically matching clients to the latest-and-greatest technology out there, such as artificial intelligence, said Viera. Carousel is wary of recommending technology for technology’s sake.
Viera uses autonomous vehicles as an example.
On a scale of 1 to 5, the technology may be at a Level 1 or 2 in terms of development. But is it practical and effective for a particular company?
“It’s not necessarily ensuring technology is solving a business problem. We’ve got to make sure we are being realistic with the hype of solutions … looking out for the best interest of customers and not getting them into something where the paint is still wet,” he said.
