With specialist support from Innovate UK EDGE, a UK company that makes things easier for installers of audio-visual equipment has boosted its turnover.
These days, and especially since Covid, all kinds of organisations need audio-visual (AV) equipment, to be able to communicate remotely. From boardrooms to meeting rooms, people need to be able to talk to each other when they’re not in the same location.
There is an art, though, to setting up AV equipment in the best way. Different kinds of kit – display screens and projectors, cameras and microphones – need to work together, and it all needs to work effectively in a given space.
AV integration companies exist to meet this need: finding a combination of equipment that will combine seamlessly to meet a client’s needs, and working out how it will operate in the room available. Good AV design can make a huge difference to effective communication.
Before they begin each installation project, AV integrators need to map it out. Traditionally they have done that using ultra-low-tech methods: with pen and paper, and maybe a few photos of the space that equipment is intended for. But now a London-based company, Sirvez Ltd, is offering a much more sophisticated way of going about it.
Sirvez’s cloud-based tool began as a survey app, unlike anything else on the market. Sirvez CEO Lee Moss explains: “the original app brings together everything you need for an AV installation project: detailed images of the room where the AV is to go, with overlays showing where the screen might fit, or where the projector will be, and where people will sit. Notes can be added, as well as standardised survey forms which ask the usual questions that AV installers tend to ask – where the cable kits will go, say. It’s all very intuitive and easy to use.”
The app now also incorporates workflow information, for managing AV installation projects. Installers can be given all the information they need before they start work, and the end user can see in advance how it will all look. The app records technical details about the equipment that is installed, and can include reports on when it was last tested, for example.
Innovate UK EDGE support at a critical point
Sirvez began working with Innovate UK EDGE innovation and growth specialist Lou Williams in August 2021. Lee Moss had been on the point of giving up the project of developing the Sirvez tool. But, he says, “Lou helped me to see that we have a really good product, and encouraged me to persevere with it.”
With Lou’s support, Sirvez successfully applied for Innovate UK’s Design for Growth Programme: this has enabled the company to develop a new user interface, which helps to show exactly where AV installation projects are up to. Lou has also helped with IP, ensuring that Sirvez’s innovations are properly trademarked. Having tested the product with respected audio-visual specialists StriveAV, Sirvez is preparing for a full launch with its new user interface. Major AV integration companies are now coming on board, including Atea (the largest AV integrator in Europe). And Sirvez’s turnover is predicted to grow rapidly, from £500k in year one to £2.5m in year two.
For Lee Moss, “Lou has been a great sounding board for us. She’s been a great friend to the company.”
