I’m writing the first draft of this post on the train, commuting to Zure UK’s office in York as I do so.

In The Beginning

I am reminded of different commute home from last year where the seed that was Zure UK would be planted. I was returning from the Integrate 2024 conference in London when my old boss, friend, mentor and fireteam member Rik messaged me the following.

As my train inched its way closer and closer to home, I became increasingly certain that this was going to be something I’d pursue to the end whatever it would be. In truth I had missed working with Rik and though not professionally unhappy was feeling a bit aimless.

I stepped off that train with renewed professional purpose, a sense of boundless optimism for the future and what turned out to be a very false sense of walking on air as I promptly broke my foot.

What do they say in show business, break a leg!

Things moved along quite slowly at first (nothing to do with aforementioned foot), there were introductions and interviews of a sort with our fellow Founders over the summer, followed by a final yay or nay meeting held in Zure Finland’s Helsinki office in September – where in rapid succession the following occurred:

• The founders welcomed Rik and I into their numbers.
• We discussed timescales and the other minutiae of setting up the company.
• We had an introductions to a significant number of the senior Zureans (who are all lovely, and a statistically significant number thereof are in bands).
• I was provided a birthday cake, as it turns out I shared a birthday with Sakari (our birthday being that very day).

Strangely it’s the feelings around the cake I remember most, such a small but meaningful gesture in that moment any lingering anxieties about the decisions that led me there disappeared like a puff of smoke as I thought to myself Rik and I are going to build an office just like this, with people just like these.

Zure fosters a culture of not just professional excellence, but camaraderie in the face of challenge and that’s what building a company is, a challenge – but one I have relished in doing.

Early Days

October I set down to finding us an office, getting us incorporated (if you’re ever wondering why our company name is so long, that’s down to yours truly), getting us a bank account sorted…all in time for Rik officially started December 8th that year. Rik’s start was just in time for our formal introduction to high society at CloudBrew in Belgium in December by Sakari in his keynote speech, we returned galvanized ready to start doing business. 

Rik bless his cotton socks had to hold the fort down till I arrived at the end of January which he did a commendable job on.

The Turn of The Year

January and February rolled by, and we were going from strength to strength; enough that we outgrew our initial shared office space because we decided to accelerate our hiring plans.

I will echo Rik’s sentiments in his 150 day post, I have worked with some truly remarkable people over the years who came through the same ranks as I did, have the values of professionalism and pride in their work that I do and like me left our original company to seek new ventures. Like Rik I didn’t begrudge them leaving (they left before I did) but non the less I’ve missed working with many of them.

Imagine my joy that as Zure UK’s CTO, I was able to hire some of that former talent I’d worked with previously, creating the foundations of a team that I am sure over the coming years will move many mountains.  In March we hired Peter, and then in April we hired Joe. Both former co-workers of Rik and I that we are delighted to have the opportunity to work with again, and grateful to have as founding talent with which to help us build our own bubble of Zure culture and values in the UK.

The Present

Zure UK today is in a great place, our focus on what we’re good at, Cloud Governance, Integration, and AI combined with the support of our sister organizations in Finland, Belgium, Denmark and now the Netherlands (we are no longer the new kids on the block!) has meant we’ve found opportunities which are keeping us all busy.

The Future

And that is the tale of how we got here. But where are we going from here? Well we want to continue to grow; we’ve already outgrown our current office (again) and so we’re looking to upsize again at the end of the year. It also means we’ll have more room for hires though who hire number 5 will be, I couldn’t say at this point but we’re laying the groundwork for them for later this year by pursuing healthy but deliberate growth, by all accounts we’re going to finish on a solid first year.

If you’d like to say hello, drop us a line at info.uk@zure.com, or if you want to talk shop you’ll see us around in the near future, we’ll all be at Integrate in June, and Rik continues to do us all proud by speaking at various conferences the world over.