HiOperator moved earlier this year into new headquarters space in downtown Buffalo.
The former 43North winner came to Buffalo in late 2018 with a handful of employees. Now it has 140 locally and more than 260 overall.
Customer service executive Bob Duggan, hired recently as HiOperator's vice president of operations in Buffalo, showed a Business First photographer around the 12,000-square-foot third floor of the Roblin building. HiOperator expects the second floor, which is approximately the same size, to be finished in February. The building is owned by developer Paul Kolkmeyer's Priam Enterprises.
HiOperator is hiring for numerous roles at its hubs in Buffalo and Dallas, from managers to engineers to customer service personnel. But the office is no ordinary call center: there are very few phones. HiOperator's tech-enabled "customer service as a service" model calls for software to simplify customer service on behalf of its clients. The idea is that employees themselves are in a much more efficient environment, and one that does away with the rigorous process of spending hours every day on the phone.
HiOperator's core business is growing from 300% to 500% every year and Duggan said he expects the business to rapidly fill the second floor space. After that? New decisions may have to be made on real estate.
“We expect to max out in Buffalo, to max out in Dallas, and then to expand in both cities beyond that," he said.
Here's an early look at the startup's new space in the Roblin building.
