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broadband connectivity, the signing of a five-year contract with fibre-provider Geo to increase capacity, access to BT’s 21st Century Network following an interconnect deal and the addition of a third “Super” Pop at Telehouse East in London’s Docklands. Then there was the launch of ADSL2+, which with a 16MB download speed and an upload speed of 1MB, provides cost-effective, quality assured video conferencing and VoIP capabilities.
But infrastructure and research and development are not the only areas the entrepreneurial operation focuses its attention on; high-calibre staff are essential to its success too. Delivering increased focus on customer management and support, while maximising growth potential, was at the heart of the company’s most recent key appointments. Steve Wood has stepped up from his Sales Manager role to the newly-created post of Corporate Development Manager while his shoes were filled by Guy Tipton joining murphx after 22 years at BT. The business has also recruited David Guy who will spearhead the businesses expansion into Europe as Strategic Development Manager and with 15 years experience in managing large-scale networks, Marc Edwards joins as Network Operations Manager.
Director Nicki Jay said: “It is very important for us to have the right people in place. We have been recruiting solidly for the past two years and the recession has meant there are some top notch people out there who are looking to work for an exciting, ambitious firm that can provide them with a secure future and great prospects. They want fresh, positive challenges and we can certainly provide them with that.”
And this structured approach has received industry recognition in the form of the coveted title of Internet Service Provider of the Year, a top position in the Tech Track 100 as well as fifth place in the 2009 Plimsoll Portfolio Analysis for UK Internet Services. Staggering sales growth of more than 160% in just one year helped the firm beat more than 640 providers of UK Internet Services, including household names such as ASOS and moneysupermarket.com.
Director Carl Churchill is keen to point out that while constantly seeking to push the boundaries of what murphx can provide, the business is clearly driven by the demands of it customers and the constantly evolving channel. He said: “We have grown very quickly over the past couple of years and there is always the danger that the bigger you are, the less customer interaction you have. That is why we have increased our staffing levels to ensure customers can speak to their dedicated contact within murphx when they need to. For us it is irrelevant what a customer’s spend might be; they all have a designated Account Manager who will work with them to understand their business and their business requirements to ensure that we are providing the best possible service to their customers.
CEO Richard Jay added: “We have built the foundations of our business on relationships, not just with our customers but also our team. We work very hard to keep personal involvement at the heart of everything we do.” Nicki Jay, Director, added further: “As a result we retain our staff which means our customers can build long-standing relationships with them.”
Carl continued: “We want to help our customers get the most out of the services we provide and identify new opportunities for them not just in the UK, but also within European markets. That is why we regularly review the services we are providing to ensure we are delivering that competitive edge and see if there are ways we can work with our partners more effectively and efficiently.”
“We believe there is now a significant demand for our services in the European markets and we’re now working to replicate our successful UK model in five other European countries by 2012” said Carl. Director Ben Murphy added: “We want to be able to upscale quickly and efficiently and give our customers the ability to deliver upon their customers’ requirements on an international scale. Our network has been architect to enable fast, scalable deployment whether in the UK or Europe and, with us already working with a number of international carriers in the UK, it is a natural progression for us to start pushing into new territories. There is yet to be a successful, truly international wholesale connectivity business. We believe we have the model and the network to make it work; one relationship, one interface, one support mechanism. murphx will be the first.”
To achieve and maintain such a wellregarded position in the industry is the result of a decade of drive and determination, which began when Richard and Nicki set up a business from home having their first set of profits hit hard by the cost of dial-up internet, with the only option being to pay per minute on an 0845 subscription service.
Richard and Nicki quickly realised that pence per minute call charges could quickly escalate when using the Internet. With this is mind Richard began investigating ways in which Internet access could be provided free of charge, where users were rewarded for their loyalty and could take advantage of some of the great benefits of this new online community.Richard discovered ISPs were rewarded with call share for each minute a user spent online. The concept was immense, utilising a proportion of the call share revenue to offer subscribers an amount of 0800 free phone access dependent upon the amount of time they spent online at an 0845 local rate. Early in 1999 Richard and Nicki set up Free call UK, one of the first free ISPs.
This innovative concept proved popular generating over 180,000 subscribers in just 4 weeks. The next milestone for the organisation to tackle was operational systems. With such a volume of users, Freecall UK’s infrastructure had to be resilient, reliable and scalable; this was proving to be a challenge.
It was then that Richard and Nicki first met with Ben Murphy, a young dynamic developer who was running a traditional business-to-business ISP based in Southampton. Ben saw and shared the vision that Richard and Nicki had and joined Freecall. | 
