• The Year in Review …And Beyond

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Friends & Colleagues,

We hope all of you and your loved ones are, and stay healthy. Being faced with unprecedented turbulence in the world has brought huge challenges to many individuals, families and companies, but it has also brought opportunities to accelerate change in many prudent ways including operating models, service portfolios and markets served. We are proud to share some updates on our clients and their successes as they strive and thrive in this new world we all find ourselves.

First Half 2020 Year in Review:

Among Our Founder Clients

Here are some of the highlights thus far this year:

Sapphire Systems Announces Significant Investment Agreement With Horizon Capital

Huge congratulations to Ian, Ralph and Martin, the Founders of Sapphire Systems, on their transaction with Horizon Capital LLP. Based out of London, UK, Sapphire Systems is the global and number one partner for SAP Business One and Infor SunSystems, and provides ERP software and services. Sapphire employs 250 staff in UK, USA, India, Mexico, Philippines and Argentina. The transaction allows Horizon Capital to invest in the business and supports Sapphire’s growth trajectory in the coming years. We wish Ian, Ralph and Martin every success with this exciting new chapter!

Read more here.

TransformAI Named A Platinum Preferred Partner For Automation Anywhere

“Congratulations to Lee Coulter and his team at transformAI on becoming the first, and currently only, Platinum Preferred Partner for Automation Anywhere, a unique designation. Automation Anywhere is privately held and raised $290 million at a $6.8 billion valuation in November 2019. Automation Anywhere is 1 of 3 unicorns in the “Robotics Process Automation (RPA)” market space. This is a massive achievement for a two-year old company. We look forward to Lee and his team continuing to build huge enterprise value for TransformAI!

Read more here.

Founder David Poole Launches New Company...Emergence Partners   

Congratulations to David Poole on the launch of his new company Emergence Partners. 

Having taken the RPA market by storm with Symphony Ventures, David and his team at Emergence Partners, “….inspire profound transformation in organizations by collaborating with leaders and stakeholders to bring advanced technology to the heart of their enterprises…” Initially out of London, UK and Boston, Massachusetts, Emergence Partners provides a range of services including Executive Coaching, Consultancy and Services, all targeted at adoption of advanced technologies such as AI, machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision. 

David is building a world class team and announced this month that James Hall has joined as Chief Commercial Officer. Many of you will know James and will remember he founded the RPA services firm Genfour which he grew and sold into Accenture. Good luck David and team!

Read more here. 

Accttwo Named Sage Intact Partner Of The Year For The 6th Straight Year

AcctTwo remains the #1 partner for Sage Intacct – a leading cloud-based accounting software platform with over 11,000 customers. Beginning in 2014, AcctTwo has been relentless in pursuing channel excellence with its partner, and has succeeded every single year since! AcctTwo is the future of finance & accounting by delivering Managed Accounting services to middle-market companies.  Congratulations to the entire AcctTwo team on this prestigious award! 

Read more here.

Enate Completes A Successful Growth Capital Round

Congratulations to Kit, founder of Enate on completion of a £2.2M growth capital round with Northern Venture Capital Trust (VCT) (funds managed by Mercia).  Enate provides Robotics Service Orchestration technologies, enabling clients to manage both their human and digital workforces. Enate was experiencing hyper growth pre- Covid and as the ‘new normal’ comes into relief post Covid the dash for digitization will become even more important and the opportunity for Enate even greater. Well done to Kit and the team at Enate and we look forward to your ongoing success! 

Read more here.

GetMyFirstJob Completes Capital Round

Congratulations to David, John and team at GetMyFirstJob on completing a growth capital round. 

Based out of London, UK, GetMyFirstJob focuses on Emerging Talent and helps young people find apprenticeships, degree apprenticeships, work experience and graduate opportunities and connects young people, colleges and employers. Since inception, GetMyFirstJob has helped over 1 million young people and in the expected post-covid economic turmoil, young people and employers alike will benefit considerably from GetMyFirstJob’s services. Well done and good luck to David and the GetMyFirstyJob team! 

Read more here.

Clear Software’s Successful Completion Of A $3.2m Growth Equity Round

Congratulations to Jon, founder of Clear Software on completion of its $3.2M growth capital round from a combination of existing shareholders and new investors! Clear Software offers both a “No-Code” Business Process Management Software (BPMS) that streamlines workflows across systems into a seamless digital experience as well as a “Low Code” Integration Platform-as-a-Service (iPaaS) that automates tedious tasks and complex workflows across systems. Well done to Jon and the team at Clear Software and we look forward to your ongoing success! 

Read more here.

Headline Recommendations for Best-in-Class Responses to the New Normal:

  • Tight focus on forward visibility of cash flows. If needed, invest in your finance function to enable this critical process.
  • If in doubt, act fast. Do not prevaricate.
  • Protect your balance sheet, secure government support, enhance access to debt, plan for DSOs worsening.
  • Keep close to your clients, competitors, and marketplace.
  • Accelerate offerings that support your client’s:
    - Cost reduction
    - Agility in cost base
    - Revenue acquisition
  • Plan for ongoing disturbance. Assume medium term (i.e. through 2021) specific industries, cities and zip/post codes going offline (versus entire nations)
  • Understand, scope and capture opportunities that the New Normal presents:
    - M&A/Inorganic - some market segments are seeing very affordable acquisitions and supportive sources of capital backing the winners
    - Organic growth – new product, services, and markets
    - Internal – accelerate internal transformation programmes to reduce cost of delivery and increase agility in costs 

The Latest at Acresis

We serve clients in North America and Europe that are:

  • -Founders of privately held companies
  • -Typically, have $5M to $50M in annual revenues and between $0 and $5M in ebitda
  • In scale-up (not start-up) phase
  • Based in North America and Europe
  • Operating in Technology, Consulting, Business Services and Energy Tech sectors
  • Either:
    - In, or about to enter, hyper growth mode
    - Well established and actively considering a liquidity event

We have 20 operating partners based across North America and Europe supported by an extensive stable of world class expert associates, all specialists in their fields.

We have opened our Silicon Valley office, joining our existing locations in London, New York, and Houston.

In working with Founders, we continue to grow our network of eco-system partners, which includes investors, lenders, lawyers, accountants, corporate acquirers and wealth managers. Click here to see a series of videos on our eco-system partners.

We also launched our sister firm, the Founders Growth Equity Fund (FGEF). This is a Pledge Fund, designed to provide $1M to $3M in growth capital to our eligible clients.  The FGEF is also a vehicle that allows our founder clients to recycle and reinvest a portion of their own proceeds into like-minded businesses that they understand very well. The FGEF has over 100 Limited Partners investors currently registered in the pledge fund. FGEF has completed 5 raises since its inception.

We feel both proud and privileged to be “founders helping founders”. Visit our website at www.acresis.com to see nearly 30 video testimonials of our Founder Advisory clients and Operating Partners talking about the issues that matter most, from raising money...to growing the business...to realizing liquidity and significant wealth creation events.

If you have any questions or feedback, please let us know by emailing danielle.park@acresis.com

Wishing all of you and your families good health and congratulations on the successes of 2020!

 

Regards,

 

Bill, Mark, Bill