Kevin M. Low is president and founder of Secured Network Services in Norwood, Mass.
PBN: What do you do at Secured Network Services?
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LOW: SNS provides information technology support services to businesses of all types and sizes. We work with everyone from small nonprofit organizations to large publicly traded corporations. For the small business, SNS is “the information technology department.” For mid- to large-sized companies, SNS provides the tools, people and knowledge to assist the in-house IT staff support the IT infrastructure. These folks rely on our experience and deep knowledge of all things Cisco, Microsoft and VMware; together we form a cohesive team to manage the network.
From our Norwood office we operate our own data center, the IT help desk, and the engineering and sales operations. Our in-house data center enables us to host and provide management services to all or part of our client’s IT infrastructure; whether it’s a single Web server, disaster recovery backup servers or the whole server room.
My role is to oversee the big picture of IT for our clients, understanding which services and solutions best fit the business. I spend most of my time working for an organization’s IT manager, owner or top executives to make sure IT is working as it should be and to help plan for the future.
PBN: Your main data center is located in Norwood, but you are also looking to add one in Rhode Island. What are you looking for in choosing one?
LOW: Yes, the entire management team lives in Rhode Island and most of us met while attending the University of Rhode Island; four of us are also fraternity brothers. We believe with production IT infrastructure you should not be putting all of your eggs in one basket. For most organizations, this means you host critical servers, or applications, in disparate locations. My strategic vision is for us to own and operate regional data centers and IT operations centers. I believe that Rhode Island is the eventual location for our primary data center and corporate headquarters.
There are a lot of factors that go into our site selection but, generally speaking, I am looking for what I call “facility flexibility.” The first requirement is power; we need ample, redundant and reliable power. The second thing we are looking for is bandwidth; key factors include proximity to carriers and the related costs to deliver those services to this site. The third is room for external equipment; we need a lot of cooling, backup power, and preferably multiple sources of renewable energy. We dream of having a facility in Rhode Island that is powered by wind, water and sun; and cooled with geothermic energies. I have told my staff that we should make the first underwater data center and locate it in Narragansett Bay.
PBN: More generally, what did you learn during your search – have you found that the state has many good options?
LOW: I learned that it is not easy to find the right long-term home for our business. For example, I can’t just put up a wind turbine wherever I want, or drop a hydro turbine into a close, but not too close, river. Also, there are a lot of pros and cons to making such a move during these economic times. While commercial real estate is in ample supply, financing and new business is not.
I have found that the state’s best option for identifying real estate, discussing options, and planning is with the people at the R.I. Economic Development Corporation. Everyone I’ve met at the EDC are all genuinely interested in seeing your business succeed, and they are willing to help in any way they can to get businesses relocated and into Rhode Island.
However, I personally don’t think that they have all of the tools and resources necessary to help small emerging companies. For emerging businesses, those tools and resources generally revolve around financing support. This is especially true when so many of the business assistance programs in place today revolve around owning commercial real estate and become available to you after you own a commercial property. For high-tech firms, their people are the engines of the business. The catch for my emerging businesses is the decision to save and invest in real estate startup costs versus investing in our people, new hires, and the tools and systems needed for process and business improvement.
PBN: Earlier in your career, you did some interesting work for Electric Boat at Quonset Point. Could you describe that?
LOW: In 1999, I was literally hired right before my MSI 420 final exam at URI by another URI alumnus to work for Computer Sciences Corp., the IT contractor for General Dynamics, as a network engineer. During my time at EB, I worked on everything networking at the campus and its many buildings. At the time, throughout the buildings, there was just about every network technology ever made, working and in production. While at Electric Boat I achieved multiple Cisco Systems Network and design certifications and eventually left to work on network and security projects in the Boston area during the dot-com boom.
PBN: What do you think the outlook is for IT firms in the area this year?
LOW: I think the outlook is good for the IT firms who provide affordable services, great customer service and dependable solutions that solve their client’s technology pains. In this economic climate, firms need to position themselves to provide the important services that clients need and want. For IT firms over the next year, I believe this means providing uptime to our clients’ networks and systems, consolidating and virtualizing servers and infrastructure, improving disaster recovery processes, and securing the network. •
