Attock Network Products, from Accrington, a leading UK provider of wall and floor IT cabinets for predominately IT sectors, has promoted its Sales Director, Henna Shah to Managing Director.
Her father, Sharafat Shah, born in Haslingden and who founded the company, nearly 30 years ago from his one bedroom flat, has become the company’s first Group Chief Executive Officer.
The company specialises in providing its products, under the All-Rack brand, to customers throughout the UK and abroad. Key sectors the company serves include Structured Cabling; Telecoms; Computer Networking; Data Centres; CCTV; EPOS; Smart homes; Audio-Visual as well as many others.
Commented Sharafat: “It is a particularly proud moment to hand over the day to day running of the company, to my daughter. The company has grown from one employee to 27 employees, occupying a 50,000 square foot industrial unit at the Junction 7 Business Park, with sales throughout the UK and exports to Ireland, Scandinavia, Denmark and France, involving a network of over 30 resellers and thousands of installers.
“Since Henna joined us four years ago from University, as Sales Director, she has overseen an increase in turnover of over 40%; started working with several new key industrial customers and introduced a major upgrade to our business model and processes, especially our accounting, forecasting and ordering systems. She has also been instrumental in growing our key supply partner network, particularly in China, where we have long term relationships going back over 20 years.
“As a result of all this collective hard work, from Henna and the team, our current sales are very healthy, benefiting from the surge in ‘working from home’ demand for IT products and the evolution of click and collect retail practices, all utilising the need for advanced computer networking systems and associated ALL-RACK cabinets and cabling.”
Reflecting on the way forward, Henna said: “I am very fortunate to take over a very progressive and innovative company, with a strong and growing customer base.
“Under the guidance of my father, I have learnt a great deal about a company I love and which has always been in my life. Some of my earliest memories are watching my father work and then joining him on the shop floor, during my summer holidays.
“I was also very fortunate to spend six months with one of our Chinese suppliers, improving my Mandarin, which I started learning at University and where I could observe our products being built from the shop floor, all the way through to dispatching, containerisation and associated export documentation. This will be particularly useful as we deal with the changes in paperwork and possible distribution channels associated with Brexit and COVID 19.
“To now take over leadership of the family business is both challenging but exciting, however it is greatly helped that I know that my father will always be there to act as my mentor and adviser.”
