Great British Scaleup: Engage Technology Partners

When I wrote about Engage Technology Partners a few weeks ago (see Recruitment startups chase the impossible dream), I thought it was just another run-of-the-mill recruitment software startup trying to make a mark in a well-established market. A few days later I was invited to meet Engage's very engaging founding CEO, Howard Hughes, and was surprised to find that run-of-the-mill they are certainly not, so I almost insisted he applied for a place on our Great British Scaleup programme.

Yes, Engage is a recruitment sector platform, but it differs significantly from rest of the crowd. Firstly, rather than addressing white-collar recruitment, the traditional stomping ground for many software vendors, Engage focuses on the blue-collar contingent staffing market – some 7m workers in the UK alone, who work on contracts from a few hours to several months and typically get paid weekly.

Secondly, rather than being a 'point' solution for just one part of the recruitment process, Engage is in effect an end-to-end supply-chain management platform covering all key aspects of the recruitment cycle, including hiring, time-recording, billing and payment. And if they need, clients can plug in their own 'point solutions' from popular third-party vendors.

Thirdly, and perhaps most significantly, Engage is designed for use by all parties involved in the recruitment process; the companies that need the workers; the agencies they use to find them; and the workers themselves. This 'one-stop shop' approach eliminates error-prone manual data transfer between the multiple parties in the process and vastly reduces the need for back-office staff.

Hughes and his co-founders are not newbies in this game. Before launching Engage, they built and spun out a construction firm, a recruitment agency and a payroll business, so they know the market from all angles.

Hughes' biggest challenge is the best one to have – managing explosive demand. I can't reveal the numbers but I can say that triple-digit growth is involved.

Watch out for more news on Engage as we follow its scale-up journey.

We'll be profiling other Great British Scaleups soon.

Posted by Anthony Miller at '07:25' - Tagged: GreatBritishScaleup