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Managed IT for industrial operations

PPK Mining Equipment supplies equipment and services to mining and industrial customers. We run its IT support, Microsoft 365, devices, network, infrastructure, backup and security as one service, and when a problem needs hands on the equipment an engineer comes out from our Newcastle office.

See how the service runs Managed IT

The brief

An industrial business where the office, the workshop and the field run on the same systems

At PPK, customer enquiries, sales orders, equipment servicing, the warehouse, supplier communication and finance run on the same systems, and the workshop and field staff work from the same shared drawings and manuals. A fault in one place can hold up a job for a customer in mining or heavy industry.

PPK wanted one provider covering the lot: the day-to-day support, the infrastructure and cloud services behind it, the security, and an engineer who can come to site when a problem calls for it.

How the service runs

Most requests are fixed remotely and recurring ones get traced to the cause

Staff raise requests in Microsoft Teams and most are resolved remotely. When a fault keeps coming back we look past the ticket for the cause and fix that. We also sit down with PPK regularly to go through infrastructure health, security, lifecycle and what is coming up.

  1. Raise Staff raise a request in Microsoft Teams and our AI-assisted service desk picks it up
  2. Resolve Most issues are fixed remotely, which is usually the quickest way
  3. Attend Hardware and network problems bring an engineer out from our Newcastle office
  4. Fix the cause Recurring or complex issues get a proper investigation and a lasting fix
  5. Review Lifecycle, risks and planned work are reviewed with PPK

What we manage

What we look after for PPK

  • Support that reaches the workshop and the road as well as the office

    Staff raise requests in Microsoft Teams from the office, the workshop or the road, and our AI-assisted service desk logs and routes them. We manage the shared workshop workstations, laptops and mobile devices to one standard, with access set around the roles that use them.

  • Accounts and the shared drawings managed in one place

    We administer Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Entra ID. Accounts, access and the shared files for drawings, manuals and supplier correspondence are managed together and adjusted as people join, move or leave.

  • The network and the carriers

    We manage the firewall and network across PPK’s locations. Connectivity is planned around the conditions at each one, and carrier faults go up to the provider and stay with us until the service is back.

  • Backup and security run inside the same service

    Backup coverage, monitoring, restore paths and escalation are reviewed together. For each system we know what would be restored, in what order and who does each step. Security controls and monitoring sit in the same service.

Lifecycle and Azure planning

Infrastructure and cloud within our managed service

We look after PPK’s infrastructure lifecycle and Azure planning as part of the same service as user support, backup and security. When a system is getting old or a cloud service is on the table, we already know what runs on it, what depends on it and how it is backed up.

  • Infrastructure lifecycle and staged modernisation

    Infrastructure that is getting old or hard to support is on our radar before it becomes urgent. For each piece we compare keeping it, refreshing it, changing it in stages or replacing it outright, and we look at backup and recovery at the same time. What needs attention goes into PPK’s technology roadmap before it becomes a problem on the floor.

  • Azure chosen around what each workload needs

    Whether a workload belongs in Azure or on local hardware comes down to its performance needs, its dependencies, how it is recovered and how easily each option is supported. In Azure we set up the foundation, with identity and access through Microsoft Entra ID, monitoring through Azure Monitor, backup through Azure Backup and security controls through Microsoft Defender. Backup and recovery are part of the design, and the cloud services tie in with the users, devices and infrastructure we already manage.

  • Costs and support settled before usage grows

    Before cloud usage grows we review what it will cost and who supports what. Infrastructure refresh, recovery and Azure services are planned as one piece of work, and the local and cloud sides are managed within the same service, with the engineers who know each side involved. We also delivered PPK’s move from VMware to Azure Local, realigned backup and brought the new platform into our managed infrastructure support. Read the PPK VMware exit case study

One service for the whole environment

PPK’s office, workshop and field teams get their support from one place, with Microsoft 365, devices, the network, infrastructure, backup and security managed together.

Fewer recurring issues

Problems get investigated properly and the same faults stop coming back.

Fewer support requests

Fixing causes and applying common standards has brought day‑to‑day requests down.

Infrastructure planned ahead

Lifecycle, Azure and platform decisions are made with PPK well before they become urgent.

Managed IT AI-assisted service desk On-site support Microsoft 365 Microsoft Entra ID Device management Network and firewall Infrastructure and cloud Azure Backup and recovery Security monitoring Technology planning
Next step

Running an industrial business on systems that have to keep working?

Talk to our Newcastle team about your IT support, infrastructure and the issues affecting day-to-day operations.

Discuss Managed IT