Home / Resources / Client spotlights / Riverport Vets
Client spotlight · 2026

We were novices, so we handed it over.

Ben Wright and his team opened Riverport Vets in St Ives as self-confessed IT novices, with a big aspiration and a tight budget. They saw Jack speak at the London Vet Show and handed the whole build over to a partner they could trust.

Practice Riverport Vets Small Animal
Where St Ives
Team New practice, team of 5
Published May 2026 Fully managed engagement
Filmed on location · St Ives Watch on YouTube ↑

01 · THE CHALLENGEWhat the practice was facing.

Ben Wright and his team were opening Riverport Vets, a brand-new practice in St Ives, with a big aspiration and a carefully controlled budget. On the technology side, as Ben puts it, they were novices: they did not really know much about what needed doing.

They saw Jack speak at the London Vet Show, and it clicked. What Ben wanted was not to become an IT expert himself. He wanted to hand the whole thing over to someone he trusted, have it happen in the background with minimal input from him, and know it was reliable, secure, and that any problems would be dealt with quickly.

It also had to be right first time and to budget: the proper foundations for a cloud-first practice running Merlin, built in phases so the technology could grow as the practice did.

WHAT WE DID · ACROSS THE PRACTICE

6 places. 6 fixes.

The practice is a connected system, every fix had to land without disrupting clinical hours. Each card below is one part of the engagement.

00

Cloud-first, with no server to fail.

Built on Microsoft 365 with a branded SharePoint intranet and a single secure login each, so the five-person team can work from any machine, with Merlin (MWI) and Celtic imaging ready to integrate.

01

Resilient internet and a phased network.

SoGEA broadband with automatic 4G backup, a Ubiquiti UniFi network and full Wi-Fi, with cabling laid for both phases so the practice can grow without redoing the groundwork.

02

Wall-mounted workstations, built for clinical rooms.

Five Dell all-in-one desktops on articulated wall arms in the consult and prep rooms, with wireless keyboards and HD cameras for teleconsultations, so the rooms stay tidy and ready.

03

Cloud phones and guest Wi-Fi.

A Horizon cloud phone system with handsets through the practice, plus guest Wi-Fi that clients join with a simple Facebook check-in.

04

Security, CCTV and backup.

Cyber security baked in, Microsoft 365 backup, and five cloud-managed CCTV cameras, three outside and two inside, viewable from an authorised device anywhere.

05

Handed over, and supported ongoing.

Beyond the build, a veterinary-specific managed service runs it in the background: monitoring, security, patching and regular reviews, with problems dealt with quickly. In Ben's words, they take it out of our hands and we trust them.

We were novices, we didn't really know much about what needed doing. We wanted to hand it all over to someone we trust and have it run in the background, reliable and secure, with any problems dealt with quickly.

BE
Ben Wright, Veterinary Director & Founder, Riverport Vets Riverport Vets
THE RESULT

What changed for the practice.

Hands-off
Runs in the background, as he wanted
No server
Cloud-run on Microsoft 365
Two phases
Built to grow, and to budget
Recommended
Couldn't recommend us enough, in his words
MORE CLIENT SPOTLIGHTS

Other practices. Other wins.

View all spotlights
CLIENT SPOTLIGHT

Martin & Manifold

Lizzie and Alice, two experienced vets, dreamed of building their own practice, a veterinary utopia. Technology was the worry. We helped them choose the right s

Cirencester CLIENT SPOTLIGHT

Pet People Vet

Ian Stroud founded Pet People as his most ambitious project yet. We planned the technology from the ground up before opening, so it worked from day one, and fou

London CLIENT SPOTLIGHT

Vermont Veterinary Surgery

Rajesh Patel was opening a brand-new practice in Virginia Water. He approached us at a vet show expecting a quote, and got a complete, ground-up plan that cover

Virginia Water

Want a story like this for your practice?

Ninety minutes will tell you. We'll map every device, integration and risk in plain English, and tell you honestly whether we're the right fit.

Book a free consultation OR CALL US0808 196 2041