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'IF WE HADN'T MOVED, I DON'T KNOW WHERE THE BUSINESS WOULD BE NOW'

Lucy Cokes founded her online marketing consultancy, Neutralize, from a flat in Kennington, South London, in 1998. Intimidated by the cost of office space to expand, she and her partner, the company’s technical director, Teddy Cowell, moved their operation to a business park outside Camborne.

The company, which exploits the algorithms used by internet search engines such as Google to enhance the profile of websites, now has more than 80 clients, from locals such as the Eden Project to the London Stock Exchange, Black & Decker and Mamas and Papas. There are 11 employees, all graduates, and two more are being recruited.

“I’m from Cornwall; that’s a big reason behind it. We heard that office space was available and said, ‘Let’s go for it’,” says Cokes. When Neutralize began it was in the forefront of a business that barely existed. Now competition is fierce. By its very nature most of their work can be done anywhere with a good broadband connection, but there are downsides to their location. “We miss out a fair amount on networking, so we have to work extra hard to overcome that,” says Cokes.

She insists that she does not miss the bright lights. “I don’t like shopping anyway so that’s fine. There’s plenty going on in Cornwall, but you have to seek it out more.” In any case, she says: “My friends in London complain that they are not doing any of the things that they are supposed to be there for.”

Most of the staff have a tie to Cornwall and she is “slightly wary of employing people who would move down just for the job, because you are plunged into Cornwall without knowing anyone”.

Heavily pregnant with their second child, Cokes works half a day in the office and looks after their three-year-old daughter in the afternoons while taking calls at home. “If we hadn’t moved I can’t imagine where the business would be, to be honest. It would have been a lot tougher.”

Damian Whitworth

THE BROADBAND REVOLUTION

Broadband provides users with a permanent, high-speed connection to the internet. A broadband connection is at least ten times faster than a standard dial-up connection, and leaves the phone free for voice calls.

Its use is growing rapidly because of decreasing prices and increasing coverage: broadband accounted for 57 per cent of internet connections in September 2005, compared with 37 per cent in September 2004. There are now more than ten million broadband connections in the UK.

Most home users access broadband via their phone line, using a system known as ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line). Local Loop Unbundling (LLU) allows internet service providers to instal their own equipment in BT exchanges and use the lines from the exchange to your home, thus competing with BT.

Some operators now offer free broadband access, though you still have to pay charges such as line rental, and there may be limits on how much data you can download in a month. Connection speeds range from 512Kbps to 16Mbps.

Ella Stimson