Hi-Grade was founded as a limited company in late 1986 by two young computer
science lecturers at the Polytechnic of Central London (today Westminster
University), James Siabi and Ori Yiassoumis, who have remained its managing
partners. With only £3,000 of start-up capital, the two partners were, to
begin with, uncertain how best to put their expert knowledge to commercial
use. While staying on as part-time lecturers at PCL until mid-1988, they
concentrated first on software - developing a package for tour operators -
and later on hardware, acting as value-added resellers of PCs made by ASI in
Taiwan. They had small premises in Camden Town.

The business grew, largely on the strength of the excellent technical
support provided by the partners. Partly as a result of their educational
background, the company has always put special emphasis on advising and
supporting customers. In 1988 Hi-Grade drew attention to itself as the first
UK company of its kind to make a practice of installing both 3.5" and 5.25"
floppy drives in all the computers it sold. Turnover that year was £500,000.
It was only the following year, 1989, that Hi-Grade became a manufacturer in
its own right. Turnover quadrupled to £2 million. Growth continued, though
at a slower rate, each year thereafter. At the end of 1990 the company moved
its headquarters to freehold premises in Barking.

The Scottish branch, opened in 1991, became a significant operation in 1992
and now accounts for about 19% of turnover. Located in the heart of
Edinurgh, it acts as a sales office and technical support and maintenance
centre for Northern England as well as Scotland

In 1993 Hi-Grade opened a Central London sales office and showroom in Camden
Town, next door to where it had started seven years previously. In 1994 a
Southern branch opened in Southampton. Hi-Grade’s total expected turnover
for 1994 is over £9 million, of which about 85% is accounted for by the
manufacture and sale of personal computers. The rest comes from maintenance,
services and sale of peripherals and software. Expansion has not, as with
some companies, been allowed to jeopardise financial solidity. This solidity
is underpinned by Hi-Grade’s 1991 transformation into a public limited
company.

During Hi-Grade’s lifetime many similar companies have been founded, and
many have crashed, having misjudged the difficulty of making progress in an
expanding but very overcrowded market. If Hi-Grade has grown and prospered,
it is primarily because of its keen understanding of customers’ changing
needs in the light of continual technological developments.

 

 

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