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Larry Keating

NPC DataGuard provides secure managed computing to businesses and professionals to protect their information, their clients, and their business.

Tell us about yourself?

I have been in technology and data security products for 35 years and have done high-level government advisory work. The first company I founded, which I still own and still run today, has been responsible for the sale of almost $2 billion in technology and services in those 35 years. I started Keating Technologies because I knew technology would have an ever-increasing and profound impact on virtually every aspect of our lives, and society. Healthcare, education, and entertainment in our personal lives, and everything in our business lives, are driven by technology.

I founded NPC in 2008 to ensure that smaller entities could access a service that would make owning and operating a secure computer as easy as an automobile. I am inspired by our clients who come back to me and say, “I love all the security and support I get with my NPC. I would never buy a computer any other way.”

If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?

As the pandemic hit, we realized we had the perfect work-from-home tool. We wanted to extend our reach and scale with external marketers. But I discovered that for emerging companies when the idea involves a change in the way something is traditionally done, external agencies may not be the right path. When you are in a known space competing on price, or you do something better than others in that known space, marketing with external agencies may work. (Even then it’s still tough and takes time.) But when you are doing something new, the agencies have no benchmarks. Without benchmarks for other businesses and strategies, they will use a trial-and-error “let’s give it a try” strategy that becomes too expensive. For us, it just did not work. They did not understand our business as well as we do.

So, if you are doing something new and disruptive, you must figure out the marketing model yourself. At least that’s been my experience over the past few years. I would have spent more of the past few years growing our internal marketing team for even greater growth than we experienced.

What problem does your business solve?

The loss of information from a cyber threat or technical failure can have devastating impact on a business. Smaller businesses and professionals are particularly vulnerable as they have become the target of cyber criminals and often have limited access to high quality IT support and cyber security services. We have made high-level information security and technical support services available to any size of business, delivered on a computer “as-a-service”, for a single monthly fee.

What is the inspiration behind your business?

As cyber threats became more pervasive and complex, I realized smaller businesses, especially those in professional services, would need a computer that did not require them to do anything but subscribe to the device and they would be secured and fully supported.

The worst day of a professional’s career, or for any business, is the day you have to advise your clients you lost their confidential information and you have put them at risk. I saw it happening, so I decided to create a product that would do something about it.

Our mission is to prevent that from ever happening.

What is your magic sauce?

We provide the most complete “device-as-a-service” offering in the market with outstanding security and support services. Each of our HP Elite series computers come with advanced security features like data encryption, enterprise-class anti-malware protection, backup of each device that updates every 15 minutes to secure data centers, 24/7/365 support services, and everything we provide is always in warranty.

If a client’s computer is ever lost or stolen or has a technical issue that causes it to fail, we replace it within 48 hours with the client’s applications and data restored.

What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?

We secure thousands of professionals today. Our plan is for many thousands more in the coming years. Our vision is to continue to provide a level of security and support services that allows especially small and medium businesses to focus on their business. We will protect them from cyber threats and technical failures that could disrupt or even destroy what they do.

What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?

I underestimated the degree of change in the mind of the buyer our product is involved with. Over the past 50 years the technology industry has created the largest do-it-yourself workforce in history. No other product requires you to do so much yourself, or with your team, to configure, adapt, install, and manage it to get out of it what it was intended to do. (Apple comes close but is not dominant in the business world.) NPC is an advanced “as-a-service” business. We change the way professionals own and operate their computer. Everything done for them. Our biggest challenge has been to convince professionals this is the future of computer ownership, and it’s a good one for them. Although that is now changing as many other products they encounter are converted to as-a-service models.

How can people get involved?

We are very accessible and easy to connect with. You can book a free consultation by calling 1-855-667-2642 and an NPC specialist will discuss your needs and help you select the right computer and Microsoft 365 solution for your business.