Since Nick started his first business in 1993 the world, and his business models,
have undergone an amazing transformation. Evolving from a small computer
shop based in the front room of a converted terraced house, to building the
first multi-vendor electronic commerce system in the UK, to consultancy with
some of the biggest names in FTSE 100, to semi-retirement, to founding an ISP
abroad, to becoming a leading developer of .NET solutions and web sites to small
businesses in the North East of England has been an incredible journey.
Since 1993, we have seen how the creativity and hard work of our team underpinned
by our Core Values has provided the means by which our customers have used the
Internet to free themselves of the constraints of the physical world and to
revolutionise their lives and their approach to doing business commerce.
We help our small business clients to operate on the level playing field of the
World Wide Web where they compete with the big boys as well as their local
competitors. Today, with that years of experience and knowledge of the latest
and widest range of technologies as our foundation, we are helping small and
medium businesses succeed on the World Wide Web.
We have an incredible future ahead of us and we would like to share the steps
that got us here.
- 1989
- Bulletin Boards & Dial In
Nick begins playing with bulletin board systems (BBS). These were
(by today's standards) very primitive dial in forums and file downloading
services for Shareware and Freeware. Nick immersed himself in the world of
FIDONet and Zmodem protocols and also discovered something called the Internet
but saw it as a backbone to link BBS systems together. He founded "The
Nest BBS" which attracted a small but dedicated band of users who could only
dial in one at a time as he only had one phone line and a slow analogue modem.
- 1992
- Demon Internet Arrives
In June 1992, Demon Internet explodes onto the scene by offering UK
customers a dial up connection to the Internet for a tenner a month. Nick is one
of the first to sign up and the world of Gopher, Veronica, SLIP and PPP
connectivity opens up. At this stage he uses USENET more than anything else to
educate himself about technology but doesn't realise at this stage how important
it will become to him and the rest of the world.
- 1993
- Online Computers
Nick opens a small computer shop in a lock up unit which is basically
the front room of a terraced house opening directly onto the street (11 Sutton
Road, Huthwaite for those with long memories). He does
reasonably well and wins several maintenance contracts with local businesses. A
hand painted sign costing £50 announces to the world that Online Computers is
open for business. Oddly, the shop has had many changes of use over the
years and is now a computer shop again!
- 1994
- Excalibur and P & L
Nick meets Ian and Sue and a partnership between them is started that lasts to
this day. They develop a graphical BBS using a platform called
Excalibur with
eight high speed modems (28.8k!) and deliver adult content on a subscription
basis. The World Wide Web is just about to explode but we didn't know it and
we, like everyone else (including
Bill Gates!) , was caught by surprise. We bought a high
powered server, installed Windows
NT 4 and shipped it off to a hosting provider in Gran Canaria in order to ensure
that we served our content from somewhere it was legal to do so and Nick used the version
of FrontPage supplied with Windows NT Server to build his first web page.
- 1995
- Computer Networks Online Ltd
Nick enters into a partnership with a local businessman (Sam Nistala) and Online
Computers is incorporated as Computer Networks Online Ltd in April 1995. The
business opens new premises in the town centre (290 Nottingham Road, Mansfield) and hires
five young employees -
our mission is to have fun and make a lot of money. It is chaotic but fun and we
start taking great delight in embarrasing PC World who have a store
almost exactly opposite our front door. We start building computers and selling Intel 486SX
based machines for just £599 including a copy of the amazing Windows 95 and keep
both of our stores open until midnight on launch day in order to be the first in
Nottinghamshire to sell a copy.
- 1996
- The End of Online Computers
Nick sees the future and attempts to steer Computer Networks Online Ltd
in the direction of web site development and provision of Internet Services. His
partner disagrees and they part company after Sam changes the locks on the shops
and attempts to remove Nick as a Director after Nick caught Sam out redirecting
the stock in trade into the service of his own business and paying staff members
cash in hand to do jobs "off the books". The battle between the Directors
is bitter but, to Nick's eternal and lasting satisfaction, within a month the stores are
closed, the staff have moved on, and Nick is working on his next project.
- 1996
- The Advanced Commerce Engine
The Adult Services Industry becomes the new Wild West as thousands of companies
scramble to make money on the fledgling World Wide Web. P & L Investments
launches a wide range of adult portals with very targetted niche content using
our servers hosted in Gran Canaria. Competition, hazy legislation, and the
demands of constantly producing fresh content led us to look for the next big
thing. We decided that electronic commerce would be a huge growth area and used
the first version of Microsoft ASP to build a multi-vendor electronic commerce
solution for small businesses. Nick visits Lanzarote for the first time,
flies to Gran Canaria and brings the web server back to the UK in a suitcase.
We put a leased line into our office and begin offering a web site with 5 pages and an online
shop for £199 + £40 a month, the system went live in a year and we had a team of
telephone canvassers working in a front bedroom. We franchised areas of the
country and successfully sold the service through our Resellers to thousands of
businesses around the UK before the business was sold off in 1999. By the
time the business was sold we were employing hundreds of staff around the
country and leasing thousands of feet of office space in a commercial park.
- 2000
- Whitestar Is Born.
Nick takes almost a year off and incorporates Whitestar I.T Ltd in
October 2000. The business offers consultancy services and web development to
small businesses but rapidly scales up in operation to provide services to
companies including Consignia (Royal Mail Group) and Severn Trent Water.
Whitestar enters into a partnership with UK Matrix Ltd to develop the most
interactive jobs site available and counts itself in a very small group
including Monster and Total Jobs as one of the first to pioneer online
recruitment targetting I.T Professionals. UK Matrix expands into electronic
commerce (through Capture View) and a new version of The Advanced Commerce
Engine is developed to market digital cameras, telescopes and inflatable
speakers! Nick becomes a Microsoft Partner and also sets up Incubate-Online
Ltd with his UK Matrix partners to develop online businesses by taking a stake -
dragons without a den! Sports Web Technologies Ltd was another partnership
venture setup in 2000 designed to promote local sport organisations using the
World Wide Web. At the end of 2002, Nick is a founding Director of 6
companies and is earning very good money but becoming increasingly stressed and
worried about maintaining the high performance he is associated with.
- 2003
- Emigration and NISCO
After the amazing results acheived between 2000 and 2003 with not only
Internet companies but also jewellery distribution and marketing (Rhiga UK Ltd
and Bluebird Pormotions Ltd) Nick and his family decided to emigrate to Lanzarote in the Canary Islands
with Ian and Sue (his previous business partners) and take life a bit easier. Nick makes the decision to
wind up all of his companies but makes one very important decision - he will buy
the network infrastructure from Whitestar. Although "taking it easier" was
the reason for moving to the land of sun and sea it didn't take long for Nick and Ian to establish the only
English speaking Internet Services Provider (NISCO HOLDINGS S.L - named for
Nick Ian and
Sue Company Holdings) in the Canary
Islands and they go on to open a computer shop in Costa Teguise selling
computers under the brand UK Computer Services. Still driven by the
need to succeed, in 2004, Nick's marriage ended in seperation (mostly
due to the pressure of constant work) and he remained on the
island building the business and (by his own admission) being too miserable by
far. Carving a niche by offering low cost
services to local businesses in the tourism related industries and to estate
agents who quickly realised that our .NET platforms offered far more
functionality than competing off the shelf systems, NISCO continued to grow
rapidly and we switched our focus from static HTML sites and ASP to the new
Microsoft .NET platform.
- 2005
- Nick Meets Julie
He met Julie in late 2005 and continued to build NISCO into one of the
most respected and trusted companies on the island. They decided to
move back to the UK in late 2007 due to pregnancy and the continuing worsening
economic conditions on the island. Between 2003 and 2005, Nick becomes a
Microsoft Hosting Partner and Microsoft Small Business Specialist.
- 2007
- The Busy Bird Group
The Busy Bird Group is launched and includes Busybird Products, Busybird
Computers, Busybird Distribution, Busybird Internet. Nick takes over the server
network and continues to provide hosting services to NISCOWEB in Lanzarote
whilst Ian and Sue continue to provide local sales and marketing activities and
face to face support. Due to ill health, UK Computer Services in Lanzarote is
closed and NISCOWEB is now operated from a home office - a common way of working
in Spain. The Busy Bird Group makes an impact in South Shields and the North
East of England by offering low cost portal services and supporting them with
excellent customer service.
- 2009
- Ladybird Internet Ltd
All of our business activities receive new branding and we incorporate
as Ladybird Internet Ltd. Our brands are consolidated and we pull together our
Lanzarote services into a new brand called the Lanzarote Business Network. We
deliberately set out to make Ladybird a completely digital business with a fresh
and forward thinking approach to doing business. Nick decides that neither he
(nor any member of his team) will ever sacrifice personal relationships for a
business or miss a moment of a childs' development because of a client - this
business will deliver the work/life balance that should be possible in the 21st
century.
- 2010
- Jaculate!
With the business engaging with new customers at an ever increasing
rate, new projects being launched in the UK and the continued expansion of the
services we provide to NISCOWEB, we launch Jaculate! Nick's business blog is
updated almost every day with news and views and we no longer update this page. Head over to
www.jaculate.co.uk for our latest news.
This is a very brief history but if you would like more
information about any of the projects we have worked on please don't hesitate to
contact us.
