Series: Meet the team–Rory Dear, Managing Director
This is part of a series of posts where we’ll introduce members of the DSL team, from across the organisation, to put a human face to one of the UK’s leading cradle-to-grave industrial computing and electronics solutions provider.
“The embedded sector has finally become mainstream.”
DSL Managing Director Rory Dear is not only a specialist in embedded/industrial computing technologies, he is also a passionate, long-term advocate of the sector.
A regular contributor to leading industry magazines, Rory’s experience and dedication to computing and embedded systems has ensured that DSL remains at the forefront of embedded and industrial computing technology with a reputation for robust and reliable products.
This commitment has meant that DSL has the latest tools and technologies to provide customers with the most functional and cost-optimal solutions to maximise their own success, while maintaining maximum longevity for the off-the-shelf and custom solutions it supplies.
Rory joined the company in 2003 in a sales role. He says: “My background was a teenage obsession with IT. I never anticipated that embedding computing technology would be exponentially more interesting.”
“My first role was technical sales, but the founder of DSL gave me freedom to explore my engineering interest, which led to the introduction of embedded operating system development at DSL, which was originally just me and an expert knowledge of XP embedded. Nowadays, I leave that to the actual experts.”
After gaining years of knowledge and proficiency, in both specifying and engineering perspectives, Rory progressed through the company, further contributing to the direction and development of the business.
Rory says: “I love the delicate balance between the constant drive for innovation and the need to be able to supply an unchanged solution for a decade or more.”
“The embedded sector has transformed from a niche industry few outside had heard of, to one that is intrinsically involved in the majority of new technology deployments, it’s finally become mainstream.”
He says his favourite part of the role is helping solve customers’ problems; often problems that numerous other people or companies have attempted to resolve before they arrive at DSL’s door: “Working together with DSL allows our customers to focus on what they do best while we take care of what we do best – expert design through collaboration.”
“I also take great pleasure in observing how our team members develop and be successful in their own right, especially when achieving things they never thought they could.”
When he’s not being corrected on his dinosaur knowledge by his five-year-old, in his spare time Rory enjoys badminton and entertaining friends and family.
During 2021 Rory turned his hand to penmanship and wrote a buyers guide aimed at helping navigate through the process of electronic product development. You can download a free copy here.