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Fivium is 16 years old but, we suspect, little known amongst our readership. The company has piqued our interest due to its rapid growth. It is also worthy of our attention as the company has come to a point in its evolution where it is injecting new thinking and making changes its business model.
Fivium was originally established to deliver a single contract for the then-Department for Trade & Industry (DTI). Since then, it has predominantly grown by word of mouth, and has achieved strong double-digit growth over the last couple of years. Revenues come from a mix of its eCase SaaS solution for correspondence case management; agile development project work; and managed services. Around two-thirds of revenues are from the UK central government market.
The changes we are seeing at Fivium include its aim to shift to a SaaS model; its drive to inject a product mentality into the business; and its push to enter new markets. To read more about the road ahead for Fivium, TechMarketView subscribers can read Fivum: From reactive to proactive in UKHotViewsExtra now. If you are not yet a subscriber or are not sure if your organisation has a subscription to our services, please contact Deb Seth to find out how to access.
Posted by Georgina O'Toole at '09:30' - Tagged: publicsector centralgovernment saas software platform digital managed+services
I don’t think I have ever generated as much interest in a topic as when I recently wrote about my chat with Greg Lawton, co-founder and CEO of Cambridge-headquartered construction industry project management tool developer Nodes & Links (see Nodes & Links CEO joins the dots).
It appears that I’d unknowingly hit upon one of the hottest themes in the tech sector: construction technologies, and I was deluged with comments from across the construction industry (and indeed from around the world) about this and that exciting innovation in the sector.
But the one that really caught my eye was a message from George Holder, Corporate Venture Partnerships Manager at US$2bn global engineering, management and development consultancy, Mott MacDonald. Holder works within Mott MacDonald Ventures (I’ll abbreviate to MMV) and is responsible for identifying tech startups and scaleups with innovative products around which Mott MacDonald’s core business units can wrap services and take to clients. He is also involved ‘post-deal’ to help ensure that the partnership is effective for both parties and delivers the meaningful outcomes to clients and society that the partnership was established upon.
TechMarketView clients, including subscribers to UKHotViews Premium, can read more by downloading the full article by clicking the following link Mott MacDonald Ventures: bringing innovation to the construction industry.
If you are not already a subscriber and but would like to learn more or gain access to this or any other of our content, please contact info@techmarketview.com for more information.
Posted by Anthony Miller at '08:05'
We are delighted to announce ScaleUp Group as the third sponsor of our 2022 ‘Evening with TechMarketView’ Presentation and Dinner in September.
ScaleUp Group was formed by entrepreneurs who have successfully navigated through founding, growing and selling businesses of their own. Their 30 partners have invested in over 100 high growth tech businesses – including significant personal investments - generating over £4 billion in exits as a result, in both the private and quoted sectors. The combination of their unique experience, guidance, worldwide connections and investment mean they support entrepreneurs on their whole journey, minimising disruption to business & getting results more quickly.
As you may already know, our eighth annual event – An Evening with TechMarketView - will be held at the magnificent Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), in Portland Place London, from 6.30pm on Thursday 22nd September.
Early Bird tickets for individuals and tables of 10 are already on sale and are available at a discounted rate until 1st May. To secure your place click through to our events partner here and take advantage of the lower ticket pricing.
To join our current sponsors InterSystems, Aqilla and ScaleUp Group and enjoy the many benefits of a TechMarketView sponsorship package, then you simply need to contact Paula Miles-Mathewson.
Posted by HotViews Editor at '00:00'
TechMarketView’s Enterprise Software Supplier Prospects 2022 and Beyond report is now available.
The latest iteration of the research looks at the challenges facing suppliers of Enterprise Software to the UK market but also identifies what actions suppliers can take to drive success across 2022, and the factors that will impact performance over the longer term.
Profiles of Adobe, Cisco, IBM, Ion Group, Microsoft, Oracle, Sage Group, Salesforce, SAP and VMware are included in thte report. It is a partner to the Enterprise Software Supplier Ranking, Enterprise Software Market Trends & Forecasts and the Market Outlook Update reports.
In terms of action points, the top three investment and innovation priorities that need to be financed and resourced are data mastery, industry clouds and sustainability. And one of the factors in on-going success will be the ability to deliver continuous improvements to how software suppliers themselves function, as much as providing continuous software improvements.
If you are a subscriber to our TechSectorViews research stream you can read the report now. If you’d like to discuss an extension to your existing subscription or would like details of how to subscribe to TechMarketView, please email Deb Seth.
Posted by Angela Eager at '08:08' - Tagged: saas cloud software AI data prospects sustainability
FPT Software may not be a name familiar to many of our readers in the UK but this is a company who has been a huge success across South-east Asia, Japan and parts of Europe, and is now bringing its experience and services to the UK market. We recently attended their UK Launch event and also had a chance to talk to UK Managing director Mohan Naidu about their plans for the business.
Founded in 1988 the FPT corporation is the largest IT services company in Vietnam, it generates US$1.6bn in revenue and has over 30,000 employees across 27 countries. FPT Software is a subsidiary founded in 1999 and today is one of Vietnam’s largest software companies generating more than US$600m in revenue with over 22,000 employees. They have been operating in the UK through partners for over 20 years before officially launching the UK business in 2019.
Clients include large multinationals such as Carlsberg, Continental, Siemens, Bayer and UK recruiter Harvey Nash. FPT was one of several companies (along with IBM, Accenture and Capgemini) chosen to deploy the Skywise platform developed between Airbus and Palantir, which is used by over 140 airlines around the world. FPT also provides IT services and SAP solutions to RWE AG, one of Europe’s largest energy providers.
In 2009, when FPT Software was first spun out of the larger FPT group, the business turned over US$42m, fast forward to 2021 and the business generated US$632m, representing growth of over 1,400% in 12 years. In the past 12 months alone, the business saw YoY growth of over 23%, right up there with Top UK performers such as Endava and Kainos that we identified in our report The Hot 10 UK Application Services Suppliers. While the UK business is still small (~£2m), MD Naidu has strong aspirations, hoping to triple the size of the business this year.
Entering a new geographical market, and one as competitive as the UK, is never easy, especially when your main business is HQ’ed over 6,000 miles away. However, with the backing of the global organization and a pool of Vietnamese talent, FPT Software certainly have the capability and scale to be competitive.
TechMarketView clients, including subscribers to UKHotViewsPremium, can read more by downloading the full article here *UKHotViewsExtra* FPT Software: Bringing Vietnamese talent and innovation to the UK.
If you are not already a subscriber and but would like to learn more or gain access to this or any other of our content, please contact Deb Seth for more information.
Posted by Simon Baxter at '17:27' - Tagged: software applications
Recent macroeconomic and geopolitical events inevitably generated volatility in all three main indices which we track. The diversified FTSE 100 however recovered much ground lost by end March and finished 2% up QoQ. The tech-focused NASDAQ and FTSE SCS remain down QoQ 9% and 17% respectively, though the NASDAQ bounced back 4.6% in March thanks to the strong performance of the leading US Big Tech stocks.
Amongst the smaller, specialised tech indices, it was a gloomy quarter, with only the FTSE Telecom and FTSE Mobile recording gains QoQ.
Subscribers to the TechMarketView Foundation Service and UKHotViews Premium can read more by downloading the Q1 2022 edition of IndustryViews Quoted Sector. Or for commentary by month, see Share Performance in March 2022 and work back to see earlier months.
Posted by Tania Wilson at '09:00' - Tagged: markets
Vocavio was one of just six UK tech scaleups shortlisted for the recent Capita Scaling Partner event held in association with the TechMarketView Innovation Partner Programme. Contenders are vying for the opportunity for a transformative partnership with UK business systems leader Capita.
TMV had the pleasure to meet Conor McKenna, CEO and co-founder of the company, at Capita offices in London.
Vocavio provides voice analytics software to developers and integrators of simulation, training and operations systems. The specific market need addressed in the early stages of the company's development is in highly-regulated safety and mission-critical environments, where operators are legally required to assess their people for non-technical competencies like communication and teamwork. This applies, for example, to pilots, soldiers and nuclear operators.
Traditional methods of communication skills assessment and monitoring are subjective, labour-intensive and therefore costly. Vocavio's software solution can efficiently grade a user's communication and coordination skills via tonal analysis of the human voice. It relies on an assessment of "prosodic accommodation", the signals embedded in the tone of speech of a user which give vital clues to the user's understanding of and buy-in to the discussion.
Vocavio's software uses "narrow" artificial intelligence (AI), where a model is making repeatable calculations of identified features. It doesn't require training data to set up and can ingest dialogue of any language to quickly calculate a communication performance by computing a correlation coefficient of various speech tones. The software provides consistent, non-subjective ratings to support instructors running a training exercise, or advanced monitoring systems engineered to monitor risk and human performance.
It is patented in several markets and available via the cloud or on-premise on a subscription model. It offers significant benefits over basic transcription technologies, which simply transcribe the words spoken but offer no assessment of the quality of communication or cognitive state of the speakers.
Whilst the company's initial target market is developers of advanced systems in aerospace and defence, there is potential benefit in any market sector in which the quality of communications is critical to efficiency and outcome delivery, for example airports and surgical operating theatres. The company has several contracts already and is actively seeking expansion opportunities. Given the deeptech nature of its technology, it has significant value to offer and we will watch its progress with interest.
Posted by Tania Wilson at '09:00' - Tagged: analytics AI voice machinelearning
Recently published accounts reveal Civica bounced back strongly from last year’s pandemic associated slowdown. Overall revenue for the year ended 30 September 2021 was up 8% to £458.9m (2020: £424.9m), with organic revenue growth in the core software business (accounting for >90% of Group EBITDA, of 8%). Gross profit improved by 9% to £378.7m (2020: £346.4m), and operating profit before amortisation and exceptional items was up 18% to £102.1m (2020: £85.6m). EBITDA also improved—up 19% to a record £110.5m (2020: £93.1m)—and EBITDA margin improved to 24.1% (2020: 21.9%) supported by the continued move away from lower margin software resale and its BPO business. Operating cash inflow increased 33% to £102m improving the conversion from adjusted EBITDA from 84% to 94%.
Growth during the year came from upselling to existing clients (new modules, moving to the cloud); a programmatic approach to cross-selling existing products into different geographies and verticals (Project Endeavour), as well as new business, supported by its ongoing sales improvement programme. The organic software revenue growth of 8% was supplemented by targeted acquisitions, leading to reported software revenue growth of 13%.
Revenue from the UK, which represented 76% of total revenue, grew 7% to £350.7m (2020: £327.6m). Revenue from its APAC business (focused on Australia, New Zealand and Singapore) performed more strongly—up 12%—taking it over the £100m for the first time (2021: £100.9m / 2020: £90.0m), but its smaller North American business declined by 2% to £7.3m (2020: £7.4m).
TechMarketView subscribers, including those signed up to UKHotViewsPremium can read more about Civica's performance and prospects here. If you are not yet a subscriber, please contact Deb Seth to find out how to access this and much more.
Posted by Dale Peters at '07:57' - Tagged: results software public+sector
It was fantastic to see so many familiar faces – as well as many new ones - at the Enterprise Awards last night, as we gathered in the magnificent Goldsmiths’ Hall in London to celebrate the best of the UK’s tech entrepreneurs at ‘the Oscars for Technology Entrepreneurs’.
Founded by the one and only John O’Connell, ScaleUp Group, the awards, which uniquely focus on the individual entrepreneur rather that their business, are now in their tenth year. This year, as chair of the judging panel, I know that it was harder than ever for the judges to choose the winners from the impressive group of finalists, so our congratulations to all the entrepreneurs shortlisted for an award.
The judges looked for vision, growth, innovation, financial management, external recognition and stamina, and were overwhelmed by the range and quality of UK tech entrepreneurs and businesses – from Emerging to Enterprise.
Many congratulations to the winners announced at the awards last night across the nine categories:
Net Zero – Dr Rebecca Harding, Coriolis Technologies
Social Enterprise – Alex Stephany, Beam
Public Sector – Sara Murray, Big Technologies trading as Buddi
Deep Tech – Scott White, Pragmatic Semiconductor
Emerging (revenues between £1m and £3m) – Alex Hously, Seldon
Developing (revenues £3m to £20m) – Alexandra Depledge, Resi
Scale Up (growth 50%+) – Adrian Overall, Cloudstratex
Enterprise (revenues £20m+) – Vishal Marria, Quantexa
Judges Special Award (all round excellence) – Martina King, Featurespace
and also to John O'Connell, pictured receiving a trophy to commemorate ten years as chair and founder of the awards.
In addition to celebrating the best of UK tech talent, the Enterprise Awards has traditionally been organised as a fundraising event, donating profits to the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists' charities to help its mission to improve lives across the UK and beyond by providing IT skills and training. Last night’s Awards, however, raised money for the Ukraine Relief Fund and we were delighted that the raffle alone raised more than £20,000 for this very worthy cause.
Posted by Tola Sargeant at '08:49' - Tagged: awards scaleup event entrepreneurship
TechMarketView’s latest Market Readiness Index (MRI) report is now LIVE for our tech buyer clients. The Market Readiness Index is a keystone piece of research within the TechMarketView Tech User Programme, for tech buyers - see: Welcome to the Tech User Programme.
The MRI is designed to help end user organisations – tech buyers and decision makers – determine the readiness of ICT suppliers to support them as they continue to transform. This year’s report is our fourth and as ever it provides a unique insight into the profiled companies, based on in-depth interviews and TechMarketView’s scoring model.
This time around we focus on the Top 10 fastest growing Solutions providers to the UK market and specifically the challenger organisations. The criteria we have used to select the Top 10 is as follows: The supplier must be a Top 40 UK Solutions provider with more than 50% of total turnover coming from the Solutions market (as defined by TechMarketView). We have not included the management consultancies in this cohort and have used pro forma revenues to reflect major recent acquisitions.
Companies included are: 6Point6, AND Digital, BJSS, Coforge, Endava, Kainos, Made Tech, Mastek, TPXimpact, Version 1.
A big thank you to all the analyst relations people and company leaders for their inputs - and of course to their customers for contributing.
We’ve questioned and probed, we’ve analysed the numbers, the investments made, and the decisions taken. We’ve undertaken a rigorous scoring and analysis exercise across six key areas:
The MRI launched in 2019 with our first report looking at how well placed the UK’s Top Ten IT and Business Process Services players were then in terms of their ability to deliver digital transformation. In 2020, TechMarketView published our Market Readiness Index looking at the UK's IT/BP Services providers ranked 11-20. Our third report revisited the ten largest players and assessed their progress as of last year.
Tech User Programme members can read the research here: TechMarketView Market Readiness Index 2022.
If you would like to find out more about joining the programme and accessing the report, please contact Deb Seth.
If you are Software and IT Services provider and an existing TechMarketView subscription client, reports published within our Tech User Programme are available to purchase. Please also contact Deb Seth.
Posted by HotViews Editor at '17:00' - Tagged: MarketReadinessIndex MRI EndUserResearch TechBuyerResearch
emoquo was one of just six UK tech scaleups shortlisted for the recent Capita Scaling Partner pitch event held in association with the TechMarketView Innovation Partner Programme. Contenders are vying for the opportunity for a transformative partnership with UK business systems leader, Capita.
TMV had the pleasure to meet Tim Aston and Jim Bailey, respectively CEO and CFO of the company, at Capita offices in London.
emoquo is a SaaS platform focused on emotional intelligence. The company co-creates, with strategic partners, digital coaching and analytics solutions to increase the engagement, wellbeing and performance of people in a working environment. The current solution set includes four products, geared towards team performance, sales performance, wellbeing and everyday workplace emotional intelligence, with the present focus being on team solutions that provide continuous self-managed support.
Despite an increased focus on employee mental health and wellbeing in recent years, disengagement continues to present a challenge to management, leading to lost productivity and employee churn. Traditional in-person coaching methods, whilst effective, are not scalable and are therefore often reserved for top-performing individuals or teams, risking further disenfranchisement amongst other employees.
emoquo's approach is to digitise the manual assessment processes used by traditional providers through a partnership arrangement, creating a bespoke digital coaching solution. Their business model is a subscription to co-create, followed by revenue share with the partner organisation. The resulting product, whilst bespoke to each partner, contains a core level of digital content, for example questions prompted based on previous responses. The company plans to build in greater intelligence and automation as the market evolves, as well as to start to quantify the RoI value of better performance and increased employee engagement to the end-user organisation.
With a recent study by Gallup estimating that 67% of the worldwide workforce is not engaged, which costs their employers the equivalent of 18% of their annual salaries, the prospective market for emoquo would appear to be sizeable. We will watch their progress with interest.
Posted by Tania Wilson at '09:00' - Tagged: analytics e-learning tipp wellbeing
We are thrilled to announce Aqilla as a Sapphire sponsor of our 2022 ‘Evening with TechMarketView’ Presentation and Dinner in September.
As you may already know, our eighth annual Presentation and Dinner – An Evening with TechMarketView - will be held at the magnificent Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), in Portland Place London, from 6.30pm on Thursday 22nd September.
Over 200 of UK tech’s ‘great & good’ are expected to attend the evening event which has become a popular fixture in the tech calendar and has been described by attendees as “the best networking event in the industry”.
It seems appropriate that the theme for the evening – and our research theme for 2022 – is ‘Building Resilience’ as we welcome Aqilla as a sponsor to our TechMarketView Evening for the third year running! Aqilla have been delivering class-leading cloud based accounting and business solutions since 2006. The feature rich platform is aimed at delivering cost and efficiency savings to medium-sized businesses and divisions of larger organisations. Designed for Cloud from the start it runs with ease within any browser on any desktop or mobile device delivering real cost and efficiency benefits across the enterprise. With customers located in some 34 countries and designed to support multi company, multi-currency and even multi-lingual operation, we’re very excited to have them on board!
Early Bird tickets for individuals and tables of 10 went on sale recently and are available at a discounted rate until 1st May. Secure your place now here.
If your organisation is interested in joining Aqilla and InterSystems as an event sponsor, you’ll find more detail on available packages here or contact Paula Miles-Mathewson to learn more.
Summary
If we weren’t all too well aware of the troubles facing us – a major war in Europe and the highest cost of living hit in a generation – a glance at the share performance in the last month would not indicate that anything much was wrong. Indeed NASDAQ was actually up 4.6% (still down 7.9% YTD) as Big Tech staged a recovery. In the UK the FTSE100 is now in ‘positive territory’ for the year – up 1.8% in Mar and up 0.8% YTD.
The UKHQed Software & Computer Services stocks that we track did not fare so well with another 0.5% decline making it a 16% decline YTD.
Winners and Losers
Purplebricks, Trainline, FDM and Tesla featured in the Leaderboard
BIG TECH staged a recovery driving the indices higher.
At the other end of the performance tables were Aptitude Software, Capita, ATOS, Just Eat, Hello Fresh , Made Tech, Cazoo and The Hut Group (THG).
More detail on all the Winners and Losers in Share Performance in March 22 in HotViews Premium
Outlook
As I write on 1st April the cost of a whole host of services are going up dramatically. My own standing order for gas and electricity has increased by 64%. My broadband and mobile contracts have also increased by nearly 10%. Council tax, petrol prices are all up. The list goes on and on. Clearly this is going to affect consumers' ability to spend. Add to that the uncertainty of the Ukraine war and you can see why many observers are talking about Recession – in the UK, US and globally.
Conversely, the last month has shown how Big Tech – which is hugely profitable and cash-rich – can ride out this storm.
But expect volatility to continue. Hold onto your hats!
Posted by Richard Holway at '17:35'
