Client PortalManaged IT for architecture and design
IT Support for Architecture and Design Practices in Melbourne
A design practice sells models, drawings and images that take a skilled person hours to make and a few seconds to lose. Most of the technology problems we see in studios are not exotic: a workstation that cannot keep up with the model, project files in three places, and a render that holds someone's machine hostage for the afternoon.
The work is visual, the files are large, the collaborators are outside the firm, and the practice is usually small. That combination needs IT designed around it.
- Typical size
- 5 to 30 staff, often with the principal still designing
- Pressure points
- Model performance, sharing with consultants, rendering
- Usual platform
- Microsoft 365, plus licensed CAD and BIM software
- Where we see it
- Inner-city firms and home-based studios
Want the number first? Our pricing is published: AgileCORE from $85 and AgileCOMPLETE from $130 per user per month ex GST, plus the AgileSECURE add-on at $44. Estimate your monthly figure in two minutes, or book a conversation.
From brief to archive
Every stage of a project asks something different of your technology
A project moves through the practice over months or years, and the technology question changes at each stage. Most studios set their IT up for the stage they were in when they last thought about it.
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01
Brief and concept
Surveys, site photos and the client's own material arrive from everywhere. They belong in one project location from the first day, shared with the people on the job and nobody else.
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02
Design development
The model grows and the consultants' models start arriving. Workstations, storage and the connection all need to be sized for files this size, and links between models should not break when somebody renames a folder.
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03
Documentation
Drawing sets are issued and reissued. One governed location with version history means "issued for construction" refers to exactly one set, and the earlier ones are still there if you need to prove what was issued when.
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04
Construction
Site queries, photos and markups come in from a phone. Whoever is on site should open the current drawing from a managed device, rather than the PDF someone emailed a fortnight ago.
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05
Archive
Years later a defect claim or a renovation brings the project back. Archives kept in a governed place, with restores tested by doing one, are the difference between finding the file and finding that it no longer opens.
Where studios overspend and underspend at once
The right workstation depends on the job, not the job title
A designer on an underpowered laptop loses time every day waiting on the model, while the person doing the accounts sits at a machine built for rendering. Design and documentation reward a fast processor, plenty of memory and a professional graphics card. Visualisation wants more graphics power again. Administration needs none of it.
We specify machines by role and test them against your own models before you buy ten. Long renders go to a machine set aside for them, or run overnight, so nobody's working day stops for one. Large-format printers and plotters stay with the supplier who services them. We keep them on the network, and when one fails we work with that supplier until it is printing again.
Scope
What we take responsibility for
Agreed in writing on day one in a Responsibility and Accountability Matrix.
Workstations and devices
Specified by role, standardised, monitored and replaced on a plan, with design software licences tracked so they are never stranded on a dead machine.
Project files and Microsoft 365
One structure for every project, version history that works, and sharing with consultants and clients that expires when the job does.
Network and storage
A connection and storage sized for models rather than for email, in the studio and for anyone working from home.
Security and access
Multi-factor sign-in and access by role. A residential client's floor plans show where they live and how the house is secured, and deserve to be treated that way.
Published pricing
AgileMANAGED: structured IT from $85 per user / month
We publish our pricing because a practice that budgets properly deserves to know the number before the first meeting, not after the third.
AgileCORE
Remote support, monitoring, security baselines and Microsoft 365 management.
View AgileCORE →AgileCOMPLETE
Everything in CORE, plus onsite support, managed servers with 24/7 monitoring, and quarterly business reviews. Usually the right fit for a studio with a server, a plotter fleet or more than one office.
View AgileCOMPLETE →Where we work
Based in Mornington, working with design studios across Melbourne
Agile IT Solutions has been based in Mornington since 2007. Design practices range from home-based studios to firms in Richmond, and many have a principal who lives on the Peninsula and works in the city. Most issues are resolved remotely, and onsite support is included with AgileCOMPLETE.
Questions
IT questions from architecture and design practices
What computer does an architect actually need?
It depends on the software and the size of your models, not on the brand. Design and documentation reward a fast processor, at least 32 GB of memory and a professional graphics card, and visualisation wants more graphics power again. We specify by role, test against your own models before you buy, and keep administration staff on ordinary business machines.
Do you support AutoCAD, Revit and our other design software?
We do not write it and we are not its consultant. We are responsible for everything underneath it: workstations sized for it, licences tracked, storage and network that suit the files, and backup. When the fault is in the application itself, we work with you and the vendor until it is running again, rather than handing you back a ticket number.
How should we share files with consultants and clients?
From one place you control, rather than whatever transfer service the other party suggested. Microsoft 365 can share a project folder with a consultant or a client, set the link to expire, and show who opened what. Over a few years that replaces a collection of portals and accounts nobody remembers giving access to.
Our models are slow to open from home. Can that be fixed?
Usually. The common causes are a sync client trying to hold every project locally, a home connection that was never sized for model files, or the working set stored in the wrong place for the people opening it. We measure where the files are opened from and design around it, which is cheaper than buying faster laptops and hoping.
Are we too small for this?
We work best with businesses of roughly 5 to 50 staff, and smaller studios growing into that range. It usually becomes worthwhile when the principal is still the person fixing the plotter, or when nobody can say with confidence which drawing set was issued.
How do we get started?
A discovery conversation. We look at what the practice runs on today, how it is managed and where the gaps are, then set out what a structured managed service would look like. No obligation and no quote pushed at you in the first meeting.