Norfolk company P1 Technology Partners is changing its name to reflect a shift in focus as it seeks to differentiate itself from the general IT market.

Set up in 2003 the Norwich-based firm employs 23 staff and turnover for the current financial year is expected to be around �2m.

The new name 'Proteo' is derived from the Greek sea God Proteus who could 'transform' and the adjective 'protean' meaning flexible, versatile, adaptable.

Duncan Cardwell, Proteo's managing director, said the company has grown quickly since it was set up, and the change reflects the shift from primarily developing software applications for customers to helping businesses whose staff need to work out of the office.

'While P1 was a very successful company we felt the brand didn't reflect the broader range of products and services we were now able to offer or more importantly our growing reputation for truly creative problem-solving,' Mr Cardwell said.

'We installed and managed systems on behalf of our clients and developed custom software applications, gaining what was then the coveted Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Status in 2005 – in fact Microsoft had become almost synonymous with P1,' he added. 'Over time our focus has shifted in a number of ways. Firstly we tend to get involved much earlier in the process these days and clients will engage us to 'solve the business problem' as much as 'design and deliver the technology solution'. Secondly Microsoft, although still important, is not so central and these days we're as likely to be designing solutions around Amazon, Google or Apple platforms. Finally we're selling a product called Fleet Metrik which among other things improves fuel consumption in commercial vehicles and is more of a fleet solution, than an IT solution.

'We realised that we were selling something completely different – we didn't implement IT solutions, we transformed businesses. The real advancements in future productivity are likely to come from the time that workers spend away from the office or the traditional working environment. Today, the 'information worker' isn't just in the office, using a PC, they are van and lorry drivers, home-workers, construction workers, mobile sales people – all of whom need to be connected to the business operation and remotely driving its workflow.

'The abundance of new tablet and smartphone devices, combined with the growing number of cloud computing services, bring enormous possibilities for organisations to transform how they operate to reduce costs and reduce carbon.'

Proteo's recent work ranges from helping an NHS trust to monitor therapeutic drug patients, helping a food processing company to work in more mobile and flexible ways and helping a home improvement company to improve sales conversion rates.

The company even solved a problem for Jeremy Goss, building an iPhone application so that the progress of his 'Back to Bayern' fund-raising bike-ride could be tracked in real-time on his website.'