When visiting Bournemouth-based Nxt2Nu earlier this year, the refurbished company said they preach “second life technology- first use experience” for its customers who are mostly B2B resellers.
The brand prides itself on selling exclusively pristine devices and changing the perceptions of what people think a refurbished phone should be, even offering a six-month device swap-out for customers if they purchase a phone that becomes faulty.
When Mobile News visited them this time around, founders Sunny Ratnam and Martijn Van Den Hout updated us on the new service portfolio which outlines steps the company has taken to elevate the brand and its offerings.
Ratnam explains that he aims to make the company sustainable, effortless and worthwhile. The service portfolio strives to be effortless for the customer, and in June this year, the order portal was introduced.
“Some of our customers are capable of using their own systems which we can connect to, so this means they can ship out products from an integrated platform,” said Ratnam.
“But for our customers that don’t have that capacity, we have built an order portal where they can log in and see our stock levels, product range and pricing, and they can order directly from the portal and we dispatch it.”
In July, the second step in the portfolio was launched where Nxt2Nu’s devices could be enrolled into its end businesses Mobile Device Management (MDM) platform on dispatch.
“A lot of our customers sell to people who have a need for MDM and this is where we brought in Apple’s Device Enrolment Program (DEP) onto the devices,” said Ratnam.
“When ordering a phone, we add a question onto our portal which asks if the user wants the Apple DEP and we can add this before sending it off.”
Van Den Hout explains that the DEP is an online service where devices are automatically enrolled into a company’s MDM tool without manual configuration.
“If you have a company phone with a DEP, you can switch it on and all the stuff you need such as apps, corporate services and certain restrictions are on there,” he said. “Your company’s IT administrator will control the settings so that you can access all the services automatically without setting it up yourself.”
The pair say this is another way to make the business effortless for customers, but they admit that this was a difficult process and originally wanted to launch it sooner.
Another part that caused difficulties was Nxt2Nu’s trade-in program, which was due to be launched in August but is being held back by a few weeks.
Ratnam says this trade-in program is geared around B2B resellers as businesses tend to hoard devices and are unsure of what to do with unused tech.
“We’re executing a web based public platform where customers can put in numerous devices, state what the devices are and the condition they are in, we build a quote, send them a box to put the devices in, and if everything the customer said is correct, we will give them the money,” he said.
“That’s done within a week or ten days and we pay for collection and pay to send it back to the customer if the device isn’t right.
“There’s no reason not to do it as it’s completely effortless and we want to give value to businesses as well as pushing these devices through the circular economy to help the environment.”
The last two steps in the portfolio are due to be completed around late October and includes the cables made from 70 per cent less plastic, and 100 per cent recyclable boxes.
Ratnam says the introduction of the new products will be dependent on whether Nxt2Nu can sell the remainder of their current cables and boxes.
“The products may have to be pushed back slightly as we want to sell our current stock and we want them to be used at least once before we can move on to releasing our new stock,” he said.
“Our new cables are made from wheat, which isn’t fully biodegradable but the key point is to reduce the level of plastic we are using- I don’t think we could ever find a fully biodegradable cable.”
Ratnam and Van Den Hout explain that the 100 per cent recyclable boxes were meant to launch around May, but they received boxes that contained a single strip that contained glue, making it not fully recyclable.
“The next one we’re launching is 100 per cent recyclable and we have a message on the film to say ‘even this is recyclable’ as customers may be unsure,” said Van Den Hout.
“It’s all part of making the brand sustainable, worthwhile and effortless.”