The economic slump has many small businesses scrambling to cut costs, but as a direct result one group of businesses is getting a boost: information technology firms. As small businesses look for ways to streamline their budgets, tri-county IT firms are seeing a wave of new clients — if they offer the right products and services.

Paso Robles-based Excelerate IT is a business technology firm that started up two years ago. Its Web site sports the motto “don’t let your systems slow you down,” and according to Chief Executive Officer John Forma, the firm enables its clients to have secure, remote access to their documents and networks. That way, small-business owners and their employees who travel often or must do much of their work outside an office can access their materials from home or from mobile devices such as iPhones.

Hiring Excelerate to set up hardware and software systems and train people to use them saves businesses the cost of creating and maintaining their own in-house IT departments, Forma said. The firm’s customers outsource tasks that would otherwise be managed internally — such as dealing with Internet service providers or installing office phone systems —to Excelerate.

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