Translating PC speak into plain English for the home PC user market has worked a charm for rising SME Dial-a-Nerd. Now it has its sights on the corporate market. IT READS LIKE one of those urban myths: twenty-something university dropout starts IT company in garage and hits the proverbial mother lode. Except it`s true in the case of Colin Thornton and his company Dial-a-Nerd.

He formed Dial-a-Nerd in 1998, after dropping out of BSc computer science studies at Wits University because he was "hating every minute".

"The only skill I had to make ends meet was fixing computers," he remarks.

"At the time, there were plenty of PC support companies, but they were focused on business clients where the money was `easier`, so when I started the company, it was a fairly new idea," explains Thornton.

Since then Dial-a-Nerd has made a name for itself as a client-friendly home PC service. Its technicians will do everything from repairing PCs and removing viruses, to helping people download music onto their iPods and other entertainment gadgets.

"The rapid growth of Dial-a-Nerd proves there`s a demand for properly trained technicians to be able to translate computer-speak into plain English, and fix problems at a low cost in people`s homes."

Today, the company employs 50 people in six physical branches throughout SA, three each in Johannesburg and Pretoria, and media reports peg its annual turnover at some R15 million. But it doesn`t just service the home market anymore.

"While I was running Dial-a-Nerd on my own I would often turn corporate clients away as I didn`t have the infrastructure or capacity to deal with them properly. Corporate customers require fast response times and specific guarantees, and if I couldn`t deliver perfectly, then I didn`t want to deliver at all. As our existing customers grew, however, they started to require this type of service, and instead of turning them away, I created a division called Network Nerds, which is staffed by highly trained technicians and was specifically structured to meet these needs," he elaborates. Between Johannesburg and Pretoria, it supports approximately 3 500 home users and around 300 businesses. It outsources to a few hundred small and medium-sized enterprises and a handful of large corporates, such as Allianz Insurance and Mvelaphanda Resources.

"We are able to deal with any size organisation with our current infrastructure," remarks Thornton.

"I`ve always tried to be a one-stop-shop for all our customers, and as their needs have grown, so have we. We now have new divisions which handle software and website development and corporate network support so that we can satisfy all our customers` diverse IT requirements," he adds.

Technology is such a basic business enabler that companies have no choice but to hook up with experts, observes Thornton. "Because IT is not a core business function it becomes one of the easiest aspects to outsource especially for small and medium-sized enterprises.

"Even larger companies like Allianz Insurance outsource all their IT needs to Dial-a-Nerd, because it is so financially viable." Thornton says that outsourcing provides a fully-fledged IT department, and companies can pay just for what they need, cutting out the wasted time and money an in-house IT department would incur. "Small and medium-sized companies, in particular, are increasingly looking to streamline structures," he adds.

Still an SME itself, Thornton believes that there are more obstacles in the way of starting and growing a business in SA "than most other countries on earth". "Luckily Trevor Manuel has reduced the taxes on small businesses, but you still need to struggle with the banks and Telkom," he remarks wryly.

Black empowerment is another challenge it grapples with. "We don`t have black shareholders, but we are very careful about procuring from empowered suppliers, and are constantly looking at ways to invest in community development and training. These efforts give us a rating of over 20% with the current ICT charter, and we are dedicated to improving this as much as possible," notes Thornton.

With no plans to expand beyond SA`s borders any time soon, he admits "he`d love to open in Pretoria and Durban in the near future".

"I`d like to think there`s a need for a branch of Dial-a-Nerd in any area, but before opening in any specific place, we always investigate the competition, population densities and average income brackets. We also insist on opening on busy roads with good exposure," he indicates.