BACKGROUND
An established self-funded Enterprise SaaS company within the Human Capital sector sought to raise £9 million to bolster its growth. Despite a decade of private ownership and success, the firm had never undergone formal due diligence. Our firm was engaged through a corporate finance partner with a special focus on Technology Due Diligence (Tech DD), which ultimately proved to be the most valuable stream for the client.
TECHNOLOGY HAD TOO MANY GAPS FOR INVESTMENT
The Tech DD revealed several critical areas needing attention for the company to scale effectively. The key issues identified included:
- Team Composition and Leadership: A VP of Engineering or CTO to address a skills gap and to provide accountable technical leadership.
- Financial Planning: An incomplete IT budget and lack of investor-friendly financial roadmaps.
- Scalability: Insufficient measures for scaling operations, particularly regarding infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and partnership onboarding.
- Compliance and Cybersecurity: Despite holding ISO certifications, the firm had vulnerabilities in its cybersecurity posture and an unmanaged IT estate.
- Code Quality: A lack of strategy for managing complex code that could lead to future maintenance issues.
- Technology & Architecture: Although built on industry-standard technologies, there was an over-reliance on third-party vendors without a robust application architecture.
PROVIDING A RAPID TECHNOLOGY STRATEGY
We collaborated with the firm’s management to address each challenge. This included:
- Recruiting technical leadership to bridge the talent gap.
- Developing an exhaustive IT budget aligned with the growth strategy.
- Designing a scalable onboarding process leveraging partnerships.
- Enhancing cybersecurity measures and establishing rigorous compliance checks.
- Instituting a code maintenance strategy for long-term sustainability.
- Refining the technology and architecture to reduce third-party dependencies and improve infrastructure.
MANAGEMENT ADDRESSED CORE ISSUES
Over a three-month period, we closely guided the firm in implementing these strategies, ensuring each step was communicated effectively to stakeholders and aligned with the overall business objectives.
SUCCESSFUL INVESTMENT
The company successfully addressed all identified challenges, paving the way for the required capital raising. The transformation of their technological landscape has positioned them for sustained growth and scalability, underpinning the value of a comprehensive Tech DD process in the investment ecosystem.
