Our Team

Andrew Longland

Managing Director

Andrew was appointed as Managing Director of the business in March 2022 to lead the business on a growth and transformation journey.

He had previously been a customer of HIT Technology, as well as a digital transformation contractor to the business, so knew the company well which has enabled him to drive forward the strategy of the business and has resulted in positive impacts for customers and staff alike.

Over the years, Andrew has been involved in numerous SYSPRO implementations in a multitude of different industry sectors across the globe.

Andrew's previous background includes roles such as IT Director and Commercial Director in diverse organisations and he specialises in business systems and digital transformation.

Andrew is passionate about helping people and supporting charities. He has spent much time acting as a trustee and non-executive director of several registered charities.

Paul Hartshorn

Founder & Head of Business Development

Paul founded the business in 2008 with the core aim of providing SYSPRO customers in the UK and Ireland an alternative SYSPRO support and consultancy offering.

Prior to this, Paul's experience has included roles such as Operations Director and IT Director in different manufacturing sectors, giving him a deep understanding of the requirements of our customers.

Nowadays, Paul is our Head of Business Development, sitting within our Senior Management Team, and is responsible for all new business activities, spending time talking to manufacturing businesses about how SYSPRO could benefit their business and guiding them through the process of selecting an ERP solution that fits their needs.

In addition to this, Paul also spends time with other members of the team, imparting his decades worth of knowledge and experience of both manufacturing and SYSPRO.

Paul has always had a passion for helping young people and supporting charities, locally and nationally, and is on the committee of several charitable organisations. He is also an elected District and Parish Councillor in his home town, giving up his time to help the community.

Sophie Matthews

Head of Operations

Sophie originally joined HIT Technology in September 2022 as our Support Desk Manager and quickly implemented new processes and created a cohesive support team to add value to our customers.

Then in May 2023, Sophie was promoted to Service Delivery Manager, followed by a further promotion in January 2025 to the role of Head of Operations, as part of a newly formed Senior Management Team, taking on the leadership of our consultancy teams as well as support.

Sophie now has responsibility for the end to end functions of our operations including resourcing, customer relationship management, customer reviews, project success reviews and support handovers, as well as helping to foster even closer working relationships with our partners and suppliers, and key 3^rd party vendors that our customers rely upon.

Prior to joining us, Sophie spent 9 years working directly in the food & beverage manufacturing industry, gaining a large amount of experience of business processes and systems and gained invaluable knowledge of SYSPRO and riteSCAN over a period of 5 years.

David Burke

Head of Technical

David was promoted to the position of Head of Technical in January 2025, as part of a newly formed Senior Management Team, and provides the business and our customers with excellent technical leadership and guidance.

Prior to becoming Head of Technical, David was our Senior Technical Consultant.

Before joining HIT Technology, David had spent 10 years working as a Systems Analyst for a company that uses SYSPRO.

He initially joined HIT Technology in a mixed functional and technical consultancy role, but honed his skills more on the technical side and is now HIT Technology's guru when it comes to anything technical on SYSPRO and related applications.

David spends time teaching and mentoring other members of the team to allow them to develop further, imparting his knowledge to them.

Paul Coppin

SYSPRO ERP Consultant

Paul is a seasoned IT professional who joined HIT Technology as a SYSPRO ERP Consultant in early 2023, following his relocation from South Africa.

With 25 years of experience in the electric motor and transformer repair and manufacturing industry, Paul's previous role as Group IT Manager included SYSPRO-related responsibilities encompassing implementation, upgrades, support, training, data analysis, report generation, and systems & data standardisation, at a group level.

Paul also managed the development and implementation of bespoke software in the early days of SYSPRO’s Business Objects, to improve group operational efficiencies and leverage the power of integration with SYSPRO.

With his experience and skills, Paul will assist HIT Technology and its customers in optimising their use of SYSPRO, to align with their business objectives in an ever-evolving technological landscape.

Cynthia Shumbambiri

SYSPRO ERP Consultant

Cynthia Shumbambiri joined HIT Technology as a SYSPRO ERP Consultant in May 2025, relocating to the UK from Zimbabwe to join us.

She previously held roles such as IT Manager, Business Applications Specialist, ERP Consultant and Senior Solutions Consultant, at companies in both Zimbabwe and South Africa.

Cynthia brings over 12 years’ experience in ERP implementation, consultancy and support, including in-depth knowledge of SYSPRO, as well as hands-on experience of SQL, report writing, Crystal Reports and advanced Excel reporting.

During her previous roles, she has led projects to improve the use of SYSPRO in organisations, as well as designing solutions, leading implementation and upgrade projects and developing training documentation. Cynthia has also spent time supporting businesses with their use of financial, distribution and manufacturing areas of ERP solutions.

Simon Wrather

Technical Consultant

Simon started his time with HIT Technology in 2020 when he worked on-site at one of our customers, providing both SYSPRO and IT support. During that time, Simon helped the customer to upgrade to SYSPRO 8 and developed further skills with the likes of BPA Platform.

Previous to this Simon's career began as an Analyst/Programmer, working in COBOL and Basic in the 1980's. During his career, Simon has dealt with many aspects of IT and business systems, from installing servers and PCs, to supporting end users, from installing and supporting ERP systems and HR solutions, to maintaining SQL databases.

Simon's current role as a Technical Consultant at HIT Technology sees him building integration and automation services for our SYSPRO customers, as well as being involved in installations and upgrades of SYSPRO, and providing technical support to our customers.

Michael Grimmitt

SYSPRO Support Analyst

Mike joined the HIT Technology team as a SYSPRO Support Analyst in 2023.

He had previously graduated from Cardiff Metropolitan University in 2015, with a 2:1 in Computing and was then accepted onto a graduate training scheme to provide support to a company that provided services to the financial sector.

In 2016, he moved into the manufacturing sector where he spent 6 years helping a company expand and evolve to into a successful business employing over 40 people. During this time, Mike gained a lot of experience and understanding in manufacturing processes and the standards that are required to ensure the company can operate efficiently.

Mike was able to return to his passion of IT support and development, whilst remaining in the manufacturing sector, when the opportunity arose for him to join the SYSPRO support team at HIT Technology.

Today, Mike provides our customers with great problem solving capabilities in a variety of different situations. He has a drive and dedication to learn more and to provide the best support service for all our customers.

Seth Keppler

SYSPRO Support Analyst

Seth joined HIT Technology in May 2024 as a SYSPRO Support Analyst, providing support to our wide range of customers with their SYSPRO ERP solution, along with various other value-adding solutions that we offer alongside SYSPRO.

He came to us with 10 years’ experience working in the plastic manufacturing industry, supporting the ERP systems (including SYSPRO), but he also has 20 years' experience in IT. He's been involved in report writing for ERP solutions for 10 years too.

Gareth Norman

IT Support Analyst

Gareth joined HIT Technology in 2019 as an IT Support Analyst with two decades of experience in the IT industry where he developed skills in project management and IT support.

During his career, Gareth has worked for brands such as UniSys, Europcar and HSBC and has built experience in infrastructure support, AD support, rollout management and telephony support, as well as being involved in projects to integrate websites with banking and online card payment systems.

Gareth's role within HIT Technology sees him providing IT support to end users at customer sites, monitoring and maintenance of customers' infrastructure and internal IT support and maintenance activities for our team.