A newsletter for owners of UK vertical mission-critical software businesses. As an owner, you're focused on building your business. But you should always have one eye on the end-game. Knowing why  buyers are paying real money for businesses just like yours is the key to positioning your own company for a maximum-value exit, whenever you decide the time is right. The last 60 days have seen some significant moves in the UK VMS space. Let's break down three of them and see what

I’ve had the great fortune to work with many founders and CEOs navigating a very typical shareholder’s paradox: their customers rarely leave them, but those same customers rarely leave their competitors either. This creates a unique strategic challenge that requires a fundamentally different approach to growth. Software companies that thrive in these conditions aren't necessarily the flashiest or the most aggressive. They're the ones that understand their market dynamics and

The Argument for "Strategic Hibernation" I just read the new article,  "Is This a Moment for Strategic Hibernation?" (Harvard Business Impact Education), by Christopher Marquis.  The core idea suggests that in times of intense political and regulatory whiplash, companies should adopt a strategy of  strategic hibernation . This approach is about more than just scaling back; it's a deliberate decision to: Preserve Core Capabilities:  Maintain essential assets and IP. Minimize E

If you're a UK software founder thinking about selling your business, but still want to run it post-sale, there's one operating model you should pay close attention to: decentralisation. In the UK, decentralisation is quietly becoming the preferred model for founders who want continuity, autonomy, and growth post transaction, without the bureaucracy of traditional private equity or corporate roll-ups. This article explores what decentralisation really means, why it’s gaining

After years of steering a B2B software business through market shifts, funding cycles, and acquisition offers, I’ve learned this: flashy metrics might win slide decks, but only a handful of KPIs truly reveal the health of your business. Here's what I delve into each month: 🔹 Net Revenue Retention (NRR)  If I could only track one metric, this would be it. NRR blends churn, expansion, and upsell into one number. If you're above 110%, you're growing even without new sales—your

Because "Artificial Intelligence" Is About to Get Artificially Uninvested Recent warnings suggest AI stocks could be heading toward bubble territory, with some valuations reaching unsustainable levels and corporate AI projects struggling to deliver returns. Major AI companies have achieved price-to-sales ratios exceeding 40 times revenue, with some pushing close to 69 times sales — numbers that would make even the dot-com bubble blush. Is the AI bubble about to burst? - Inves

How many times have you been told for months that an important deal is definitely going to happen, been reassured that the buyer is 100% committed, that the budget is approved and the business case signed off, only for the deal to slip away for reasons that 'nobody could have predicted'.  You've been looking at sales 'Pipelie'. A reliable sales forecast is crucial and hinges on high-quality opportunity pipelines created by your sales team. Let’s delve into why this matters: S

For many founders of medium-sized UK software businesses, the question of “what next?” looms large. After years of building a profitable, mission-critical product, the natural instinct is to explore a sale—perhaps to a strategic acquirer or private equity. But there’s another path that’s gaining traction: transitioning to an  Employee Owned Enterprise (EOE) . 💡 What Is Employee Ownership? An EOE is a business structure where employees collectively own a significant stake in

Research paper from UK university cautions that received wisdom of sustainability associated with next-generation mobile technology is...

Schneider Electric is kicking off its annual student competition in India – the Schneider Go Green challenge 2022, in collaboration with...

This article appears in the July/August issue of Wired here. To cut the carbon, programmers are cutting the code. Call it green...

I have been catching up on my news feeds this afternoon and found myself thinking about the latest Raspberry PIs going up to the...

I've come across a great (and accessible) research paper for coders to look at how they can measure the impact of their software and how...

How is your website impacting the planet? Estimate your web page carbon footprint: By using this carbon calculator, you agree to the...

Software powers much of our modern world, from personal productivity to organizational transformations. Software can also play a critical...

A project called GreenSoft at Texas State University have built a great tool for understanding how green your code is. GreenCode is the...

In measuring energy consumption of software a move towards multi-dimensional, rich metadata-supplemented metrics offer better...

Originally published by Harvard Business Review 18/9/20 @ https://hbr.org/2020/09/how-green-is-your-software Without doubt, software is...

This blog explores how software developers in all settings can make micro changes to deliver big improvements from the energy expended on...