RIG consultant in Entrepreneur Country magazine

An article written by RIG consultant Paul Higgins was published in the November edition of Entrepreneur Country magazine as part of Global Entrepreneurship Week.

Entrepreneur Country is a community of entrepreneurs, investors, corporate partners and media who believe that entrepreneurship and independent business growth are vital to the future of the UK and Europe. The community meets twice a year and gathers online for information and inspiration and connections. The magazine is published monthly.

Paul’s article, entitled “Can you be a lean startup and a visionary entrepreneur?”, discusses whether following the methodologies in Eric Ries’ new book, The Lean Startup would prevent entrepreneurs from building truly transformational companies.

Read the article online on page 16 of Entrepreneur Country’s November edition.

Posted by Paul Higgins on November 14, 2011 at 12:27 am in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

Long-term RIG client acquired by NASDAQ OMX

The NASDAQ OMX group will integrate Glide Technologies, founded in 2003, into its Corporate Solutions to create the first and only fully-integrated workflow solution for investor relations and public relations professionals.

Sam Phillips, Chief Executive Officer, Glide Technologies said: ‘We are excited to combine our market-leading set of PR products with NASDAQ OMX Corporate Solutions’ robust IR offerings. This provides IR and PR professionals with a unique and comprehensive proposition of integrated services on a united platform. It is a hugely exciting and logical step for our company to be taking.’

Since 2005 Rapid Innovation Group consultants have worked with Glide Technologies to develop the market offering, proposition, processes, practices and people. We look forward to watching the company develop as part of the well-respected NASDAQ OMX Group.

Posted by Paul Higgins on October 24, 2011 at 12:52 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG client featured in The Economist

The Economist’s science and technology blog, Babbage, reports on Permasense’s innovative solution for monitoring pipe corrosion in oil and gas refineries. To read the article, visit http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/10/corrosion-monitoring.

For more information on Permasense, visit their website at http://www.permasense.com.

Posted by Paul Higgins on October 4, 2011 at 3:27 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

Three former RIG clients recognised in Times Tech Track 100

The eleventh annual Tech Track 100 league table supplement was published in The Sunday Times on 18 September 2011.

The 2011 Tech Track 100 ranked Britain’s private tech (TMT) companies with the fastest-growing sales over the latest three years, from 2007 to 2010, or 2008 to 2011. Growth ranged from 37% pa to 361% pa, with sales typically between £5m and £50m. Three former RIG clients were recognised on the list.

Toluna (#27) runs online surveys for market-research companies such as Ipsos and GfK. Chief executive Frederic-Charles Petit founded the business in 2000 with £2m from Eurovestech, a European investment fund. Toluna floated on the Alternative Investment Market five years later, but was taken private in April this year by the Belgian investment firm Verlinvest in a deal that valued the company at more than £160m, and with Invesco retaining a stake. Sales have climbed 81% a year from £12.5m in 2007 to £73.6m in 2010, boosted by a series of acquisitions that culminated in the £24m purchase of Microsoft’s online survey business in 2009. Its online community generates more than 1m votes a day.

Fourth Hospitality‘s (#48) software is used in 16 countries, including Russia, Germany and South Africa. Husband and wife Derek and Edwina Lilley founded Fourth Hospitality in 1999 after running several restaurants in northwest England. The company provides web-based planning software for restaurants and hotels to manage staffing, invoicing and stock control. An iPhone app was launched in April and is offered to customers so that tasks like checking rotas can be done remotely. Chief executive Ben Hood has overseen sales growth of 61% a year from £2.4m in 2007 to £9.9m in 2010, and in March ECI Partners invested an undisclosed sum for a majority stake.

Solar Communications (#87) has been transformed since 2007 when it was bought by its current chief executive Mark Colquhoun, who has run several businesses, including a game lodge in South Africa. It now specialises in unified communications, helping companies to integrate phone, text messaging and voicemail with more sophisticated telecoms. Typical clients have 200 to 3,000 employees and include Portman Travel, World First, and the College of Law. Sales at the Wiltshire company have grown 40% a year from £2.7m in 2007 to £7.5m in 2010, and it plans to release a mobile-phone application shortly, enabling its clients to dispense with their desk phones altogether.

Posted by Paul Higgins on September 18, 2011 at 3:29 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

Former RIG client in GrowthBusiness Top 50 Rising Stars 2011

Solar Communications, the provider of telecommunication solutions to businesses, has been recognised by GrowthBusiness as one of its Top 50 Rising Stars of 2011, the annual list of the UK’s most exciting businesses with the fastest-growing sales and profits in the UK last year.

The annual Rising Stars ranking is the only such research to consider both profit and turnover growth in its assessment. The Rising Stars have combined sales of £1.4 billion, up 7 per cent on last year’s list, while total profits have reached £287 million.

Wol Kolade, managing partner of ISIS Equity Partners and GrowthBusiness blogger, comments in his blog post this month that the Rising Stars of 2011 represent some welcome light at the end of a dark economic tunnel.

Solar’s customers operate across a range of sectors, including health, education, legal, travel, manufacturing and finance. Chief Executive Mark Colquhoun took the helm when the business was losing money and has since turned the company around. RIG worked with Mark to categorise Solar’s customer base and optimise its account management and development function. As part of the project RIG was involved in the selection and recruitment of a sales leader to drive Solar’s continued revenue growth.

For more information about Solar Communications, please visit their website www.solar.co.uk.

Posted by Paul Higgins on September 13, 2011 at 3:30 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG helps client secure major partnership to substantially scale deployment

RIG has been instrumental in helping a client sign a partnership agreement with a major services company with an annual turnover of $4bn. The partnership will focus on building a ‘next-generation’ sustainability platform.

RIG realised that by finding a company to partner with prior to product build, it could enable its client to have access to market and end-user expertise to inform development, build early momentum before product launch and drive rapid market deployment. RIG drove the whole process from partner selection to an agreement being signed.

The partnership has already begun work on building the solution, which it is planning to have ready for roll out in the first half of 2012.

Posted by Paul Higgins on August 20, 2011 at 3:31 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG client wins customers in US and Germany

RIG has been working with Permasense, a UK-based provider of corrosion monitoring systems for the oil and gas industry since October 2010 to grow their market presence with thin the O&G majors and scale their revenue generation capability. In the first 8 months of our collaboration we have enabled Permasense to win multiple customers in the US and Germany in both the upstream and downstream markets. The company, with RIG’s assistance, has further visibility of customer wins in the Scandinavian, South-East Asian, US, Canadian and Latin American markets in Q3-Q4 2011.

For more information about Permasense, visit their website at permasense.com.

Posted by Paul Higgins on July 16, 2011 at 3:32 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG client takes on new funding round

Dublin-based technology company ServiceFrame has secured EUR950,000 in funding for its future growth plans.

EUR450,000 of the funds come from the Bank of Ireland Seed and Early Stage Fund with the remainder provided by Enterprise Ireland and members of the executive team.

ServiceFrame’s technology enables companies around the world to effectively evaluate, manage and govern their strategic outsourcing environments. Its clients include Ericsson, Royal Sun Alliance and Warner Music.

The company will use the funds to drive further growth in the UK and US markets and expects to hire new sales and technical staff over the next six months to support its growth plans.

For more information about ServiceFrame, please visit www.serviceframe.com

Posted by Paul Higgins on April 7, 2011 at 3:33 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG partners with innovator in sourcing governance software

RIG has started working with ServiceFrame, an innovator in sourcing governance. ServiceFrame is a limited company headquartered in Ireland. The company has grown rapidly since it was formed in 2009. It is funded by private and institutional investors.

ServiceFrame helps Enterprises drive Governance Capability in Shared Service Centre Operations, implement Evidence-based Supplier Management processes, and drives world-class Services governance from Service Providers to their customers. RIG will assist ServiceFrame’s management team accelerate the firm’s growth in a variety of different sectors across the US, Europe, and Asia.

For more information on ServiceFrame, please visit www.serviceframe.com

Posted by Paul Higgins on March 30, 2011 at 3:36 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

Private equity firm invests in former RIG client

Mid-market private equity firm ECI Partners has invested in former RIG client, Fourth Hospitality, a provider of back-office technology to the hospitality sector.

The funding from ECI will be used to continue Fourth’s growth internationally, finance new product development and fund new bolt-on acquisitions.

Fourth now operates in 20 countries, including the US, Russia, Germany and South Africa, and clients include Pizza Express, Fuller’s, and Hilton hotels. Its revenues in the year to August 2010 rose by 17 per cent.

For more information on Fourth Hospitality visit www.fourthhospitality.com

Posted by Paul Higgins on March 21, 2011 at 3:37 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)

         

RIG blog readership passes 5,000

Rapid Innovation Group’s weekly blog has just passed 5,000 readers from 51 countries since its inception in January 2009.

The purpose of the blog is twofold: first, to serve as a useful resource on all aspects of revenue generation for ambitious entrepreneurs, particularly of B2B technology-based companies; and second, to give high-calibre graduates and undergraduates an insight into RIG’s business culture.

The blog discusses topics on Account Management, Demand Generation, Entrepreneurship, Partnering, Pricing, Recruitment, Sales, Strategy, Technology, Venture Capital, and on RIG itself as a company.

Please click here to read RIG’s blog posts.

Posted by Paul Higgins on January 28, 2011 at 3:38 pm in News | Permalink | Comments (0) | Trackback (0)