HTS about the collaboration with ECIT: A great focus on security

HTS, a Norwegian, family-owned company, stands for Hans Torgersen & Sønn. For more than 100 years the company has built its brand on tradition, innovation, and quality. They started as a saddle maker, and have since developed many well-known brands, among these Barnas Hus, Etto, BeSafe, Voksi, Hamax, Swisseye, Packline, Loydsm, and Paxster. HTS has grown to become a global company with employees in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, UK, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Portugal, and China. In total, the company occupies approx. 950 employees.

We have been very lucky to interview the IT manager in HTS, Jostein Støen.

IT support for 150 employees 

HTS became a customer of ECIT in 2006.  

"A good and close dialogue has been important, and we are very pleased with the service we have received. As of today, ECIT is responsible for IT support for approx. 150 employees. We feel confident that ECIT is a professional IT partner that continuously evaluates and offers solutions that are as efficient and safe as possible for us.  

We have experienced tremendous growth in the last 10 years. For that reason, we have had to both strengthen our IT department and the cooperation with external partners such as ECIT. Previously, an IT consultant could handle all systems, but the technological development has become more extensive, and the systems, therefore, require more in-depth expertise. This especially applies to consultancy in the areas of IT security and cloud services." - Jostein Støen, IT manager at HTS. 

Benefits of outsourcing IT services 

"The benefits of outsourcing the IT operation are many. Firstly, we do not need to think about these areas but can focus fully on the field we work within. We are well taken care of, and the systems are always up to date. We are currently three people working in the IT department for the entire group. ECIT has been and still is an important partner for us to operate safely and soundly.  

Another important thing concerns the level of flexibility. We currently have an employee on parental leave who usually works with support as well as digitization projects. We, therefore, accepted an offer to outsource the function to ECIT during this period, and this has worked very well.  

It is also worth mentioning that since we do not have a large IT department, we would never have had the time or opportunity to understand all the updates and rules regarding our IT operations. We are therefore dependent on having a partner with whom we can consult." - Jostein Støen, IT manager at HTS. 

Consultancy once a week

"Today, we have a consultant from ECIT who works for us oncea week. ECIT contributes with user support so that we can focus on other things. Examples of support are tasks such as preparation of pc, network problems, hardware errors, orders, setup of VPN and network,etc. In the last year, there has been a lot of support related to Teams and home offices." - Jostein Støen, IT manager at HTS. 

Infrastructure in several countries 

"ECIT has helped us with infrastructure and network equipment in China, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Sweden." - Jostein Støen, IT manager at HTS.

Servers 

"We have our servers placed locally in our office, where ECIT manages both operations, updates, monitoring, and backup. There have been some problems, but ECIT has quickly sorted them out. The procedures are built around a flat structure with room for ideas." - Jostein Støen, IT manager at HTS.