Every business starts with a dream and rests on many hopes. On its journey to tomorrow, it has to grapple with various problems while growing consistently and also keep pace with rapidly evolving technology – the last of which is both a necessity and a difficulty. This is where Edafio Technology Partners steps in to lend a helping hand to businesses by tending to all their technological needs.
Born out of the need to help an accounting firm—JPMS, and improve its financial and operational efficiencies, Edafio launched in 1999 with a mission to help its clients protect, run, and grow their businesses. It aims to become a trusted partner for its clients, proactively identifies opportunities and problems, and delivers both proven and emerging technology solutions.
The company’s mission to enable its client’s success has been embedded within the culture of the company, and that is being acknowledged by all the associates.
Today, Edafio has become Arkansas’s largest full-service technology provider and ranks as the nation’s top managed service provider (MSPs). It has also been recognized as the ‘Business of the Year,’ ‘Best Places to Work in IT (Information Technology),’ and as ‘Most Admired IT Company in Arkansas.’
Early Roots of Excellence
The team at Edafio says, “Early in our growth, we recognized the critical importance of culture. We further articulated our reason for being and moral compass by a set of expressed core values: to act as one team, unified by humility and mutual respect, with unquestionable integrity, and — we can never over-emphasize — driven by a relentless commitment to client success. These core values permeate every nook and cranny of Edafio.” This has even become the guiding principle of hiring and performance evaluation at Edafio.
Edafio’s focus is to deliver a higher professional standard of technology services, capabilities, and customer service also led to early adoption and gold partnership with Microsoft’s leading-edge technology solutions. However, they continue to preserve the best qualities of Arkansas culture, community, and client-centeredness, which has proved to be a powerful combination and driver of growth.
Five Pillars of Service
Edafio systematically gathers feedback from clients to ensure that it is not just promoting its brand identity but consistently delivering what it has pledged to do so. The company has been organizing its service offerings into five categories or pillars unified by the common principles, each reflecting on what it can do well and stay true to client expectations.
1. Information Technology Consulting: Edafio engineers bring their experience and wide range of specialties to align with client’s need for support for projects that lie outside their in-house expertise. This can be something like a network running slower than it should during critical hours, problems emerging due to corrupt data, or general or specific concerns regarding security breaches.
It’s special offerings in the Information Technology niche are IT and security strategy, M365 Setup and Migrations, Virtualization Technologies like Hyper-V, VM Ware, Citrix Xen, and the list may go on!
2. Information Technology Management Services: The company provides a single point of contact for all technology infrastructure management needs. An engineer is dedicated to monitoring and supporting each client 24/7/365, so response times are accelerated, and clients can focus on their core business.
3. Cybersecurity: Edafio offers clients security risk assessments, security awareness training, Cyberbundles, MDR (Manage Detection & Response), IR (Incident Response), etc. Security expertise is a foundational component of Edafio’s managed services offering.
4. Cloud Computing: Edafio brings years of direct experience in transitioning clients from on-premises solutions to both public and private cloud offerings to grow as the organization grows and provides just-in-time server infrastructure as needed.
5. Healthcare: Hospital systems are Edafio’s largest clients and it has become a one-stop shop for clinics and hospitals. Accordingly, their services include strategic planning, HIPAA compliance, practice workflow, EMR/PM vendor management, care management best practices, and practice transformation.
Navigating Roadblocks
Even as Edafio expands rapidly, it faces several challenges to its growth. Recruiting talent in a competitive market is one of its top challenges as not only top-notch salaries have to be given but also opportunities for growth along with training and career planning.
Till now, Edafio’s culture has been its standout point, but the company acknowledges that culture can dissipate in the context of rapid growth, increasing size, and geographical expansion. Sustaining client relationships has also become difficult because of the lack of face-to-face contact due to geographical expansion that goes beyond the IT company’s historically limited regional concentration.
The team maintains a positive outlook, though, “Being part of a growing business with an emphasis on people and a spirit of innovation always plays a positive role in overcoming the challenges to motivation and morale. This is the classic exercise of preserving our core while at the same time stimulating growth and innovation.”
Adapting to a Changing Market
Edafio adapts to changing market conditions by employing innovative technologies practically and strategically. They conduct formal evaluations of the new technologies in the market for the company and the clients too. The Microsoft Gold partnership has been immeasurably helpful in maintaining the quality and efficiency of this task.
Also, it provides regional MSP (Managed Services Provider) access to the world’s best technology, tools, and ideas.
The team claims, “It is equally important to add that every new technology is not synonymous with innovation that adds real value. Edafio refers to our technology services as ‘intelligent’ because they are tailored precisely to the client’s needs. We aim to do no less, and no more than the needs and best interests of the client are served. This idea also represents how Edafio adapts to the market orientation.”
Next Chapter
The story of Edafio’s founding, maturation, and future trajectory could be described in chapters. Their past growth has been consistent and impressive, and recently they have announced a strategic investment from M/C Partners, which is a Boston-based private equity firm focused on businesses in the digital infrastructure and technology services sectors.
The team outlines the future of Edafio and says, “The vision driving this new partnership will enable additional growth opportunities for Edafio —including enhanced service capabilities and regional expansion. From M/C’s point of view, the MSP market opportunity is a key focus area, and the investment in Edafio recognizes our broad range of customers across the region and specialized expertise in industries such as healthcare that have increasingly complex and evolving IT needs. The prospects for this latest chapter — and the future ahead for Edafio Technology Partners, our clients, and associates — couldn’t be brighter.”
