Latest news with #LyndonStickley
Yahoo
05-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
How school run led CEO to 'coffee roulette' with staff and billion pound vision
Lyndon Stickley tries to 'scare a lot of people away' when he oversees first interviews for roles at cloud-accounting start-up iplicit. Yet Stickley, who bills himself as a go-to-market evangelist after successfully scaling and selling six previous companies, is far from your ruthless CEO. For the zest in which he describes his involvement with iplicit and why he won't be exiting a business for a seventh time – one of his previous projects includes London's largest graveyard – makes him a particularly charismatic leader. Hampshire-based Stickley is aiming to take the remote-first firm — he takes part in daily 'coffee roulette' mornings with employees — to unicorn status by 2030, by making it the "on-premises salvation" for mid-market businesses and their 'outdated' finance systems. Read More: Meet Britain's 'king of billboards' who sold his business for £1bn Launched in 2019, iplicit gained a top 20 place among UK firms in the FT1000 list of Europe's fastest growing businesses. Last year, the firm was one of the Sunday Times' medium business top places to work. So, to those job interviews. 'I say it might not be for you and tell them that this is a place for really passionate, slightly unhinged mountain climbers,' says Stickley, who built and sold his first company, an ISDN tech firm, for £40m before turning 30. 'If you say we are off on a mountain climb which will take three months and you might lose a finger to frostbite but we will stick a flag at the top, we are looking at the one person who will lean in where the other 19 won't.' The fact he is even discussing iplicit's marketplace rise is, he says, down to luck. 'Happenstance has been the foundation of everything,' he adds. Stickley tells the story of how Ian Andrews, an engineer by heart, spent 20 years running a company called Concept Software and becoming one of the UK's leading implementation consultancies for the likes of Oracle. He had been introduced by a friend on the school run who said he should look at Andrews' accounting software business. Shortly afterwards, Andrews spent two hours explaining to Stickley about large scale enterprise resource planning (ERP) – an area in which the serial entrepreneur had no experience. Once vendors had concluded software deals, Andrews would place people on site for up to two years and charge hundreds of thousands of pounds for implementation work. 'It was a world that blew my mind,' says Stickley. 'After 20 years, he told me, he realised he was part of the machine that was stacked against the customer, who was also getting mugged rather than it being implemented out of the box,' Stickley recalls of their first meeting. Read More: The boss who has found 'nature's answer to plastic' 'He said to me that he decided to build a better system by investing £1.5m of family savings and a friend who did the same. They carved off some engineers and created an accounting solution [iplicit] which could be deployed in days and compile reports in hours not weeks, with low disruption.' Stickley asked how many customers iplicit had, to which Andrews replied none. It was, however, the start of an unlikely relationship, given that Stickley would usually have refrained from any reckless decisions in previous investments. Having promised his friend, Stickley made some calls and was told to give it a wide berth. One final network call to a co-founder of legacy finance firm Exchequer, who he knew over 20 years previously, changed the direction. After looking at the software, he was left enthused by its power and low touch. With Stickley investing £1m into Andrews' business, iplicit swelled to around 20 staff, went to market in 2019 and immediately started winning top accountancy awards they hadn't entered. Iplicit's plan had been how to overcome the issue of customers buying finance software off an unknown player in the market. COVID not only levelled the playing field, with video meetings and iplicit's shorter implementation times, but also propelled the appeal from mounting customers who had non-cloud system issues. Iplicit realised that it could serve 100,000 sites, often multi-company locations, with a 25% market share goal and a £500m a year business. 'We couldn't have possibly contrived that [accounting software giant] Sage would drop a royal ball and not have something for the vast majority of its base,' says Stickley. The industry had also taken notice. Stickley was told by Oystein Moan – the executive chairman of Visma who took the company to unicorn status – that iplicit was a multi-million pound opportunity in the UK alone. Last year, Moan and Nic Humphries, one of the biggest private equity players in the business-to-business software space, joined iplicit's advisory board. Read More: 'Why we set up a sustainable mobile operator to save people money' Stickley's entrepreneurial spirit had been gained from his father, who had a chicken farm at 16, ran a nightclub in his twenties and worked with artists like Lulu and the Rolling Stones. Aged 17, Stickley junior took Wednesdays off sixth form college to sell kitchenware at the local market, earning £200. At university, he ran five club nights across Portsmouth in the late 1980s before his penchant for scaling businesses. 'The worst and the best I have been involved in is the most human connected and impactful business,' Stickley says of Kemnal Park, which he describes as the UK's first cemetery to celebrate life and built for people to return. 'The 'thank yous' were non stop,' he says, 'when you can see week in, week out people come back and be inspired by the place where they have buried a loved one.' Stickley met Andrews as the former was leaving the cemetery business, with iplicit planning for two years before launch. From 2006 to 2022, Stickley worked part-time three days a week. He took the helm as CEO when he realised that the business wouldn't be sold and is now working as if 'back in my twenties'. The firm has one office in Poole, Dorset with 25 employees, and around 135 working remotely. Stickley says iplicit's growth has been down to lifting the barriers of geography and has U-turned on seeing recruitment agencies as 'the enemy'. 'Getting a good recruitment pipeline means you have talent on tap when you need it,' Stickley adds. 'There's no way you can grow fast like this and do the recruitment function as you can't afford mediocrity to creep into the camp.' Iplicit's goal, he says, is to become the de facto standard in the UK before any entrance into the US. It currently serves over 43,000 daily users in over 3,000 organisations. 'We have the best tech, team and trajectory and an advantage that no one else has in the market right now,' he adds. All thanks to that school run chat and Andrews being a few months shy of running out of money before meeting iplicit's future CEO. 'What doesn't make him bonkers is he didn't go bust, so now he's a genius, right? Because he really was," says Stickley. "But if it had gone bust, he was bonkers. It was a fine line.' Coffee roulette and remote-first You value the relationships more when you don't have them on a plate every day. We get together six times a year and we all hug across 150 people as we aren't in the office getting bored with each other. The video efficiency is unbelievable. I can have 15 meetings in a day and include coffee roulette in that, which was invented by one of our techies where a random name generator pairs two people to have 20 minutes together. I found it so insightful I now have around 25 coffee roulettes a month virtually across the country. It takes the drudge out of the work and makes meetings more concise. We don't recruit younger people typically; they deserve a right of passage in an office. We are heavily biased towards over 35s as we suit the young families and older, experienced employees and appeal to an audience who don't want to commute. We measure trust by measuring outputs, not by checking in on people. Read more: The life lesson behind a 335-year-old funeral business? 'Never sleep on an argument' Meet the company that finds 'must-haves' to make everyday life easier Impossibrew CEO says Dragons' Den failure sparked alcohol-free brand's riseSign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
05-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
How school run led CEO to 'coffee roulette' with staff and billion pound vision
Lyndon Stickley tries to 'scare a lot of people away' when he oversees first interviews for roles at cloud-accounting start-up iplicit. Yet Stickley, who bills himself as a go-to-market evangelist after successfully scaling and selling six previous companies, is far from your ruthless CEO. For the zest in which he describes his involvement with iplicit and why he won't be exiting a business for a seventh time – one of his previous projects includes London's largest graveyard – makes him a particularly charismatic leader. Hampshire-based Stickley is aiming to take the remote-first firm — he takes part in daily 'coffee roulette' mornings with employees — to unicorn status by 2030, by making it the "on-premises salvation" for mid-market businesses and their 'outdated' finance systems. Read More: Meet Britain's 'king of billboards' who sold his business for £1bn Launched in 2019, iplicit gained a top 20 place among UK firms in the FT1000 list of Europe's fastest growing businesses. Last year, the firm was one of the Sunday Times' medium business top places to work. So, to those job interviews. 'I say it might not be for you and tell them that this a place for really passionate, slightly unhinged mountain climbers,' says Stickley, who built and sold his first company, an ISDN tech firm, for £40m before turning 30. 'If you say we are off on a mountain climb which will take three months and you might lose a finger to frostbite but we will stick a flag at the top, we are looking at the one person who will lean in where the other 19 won't.' The fact he is even discussing iplicit's marketplace rise is, he says, down to luck. 'Happenstance has been the foundation of everything,' he adds. Stickley tells the story of how Ian Andrews, an engineer by heart, spent 20 years running a company called Concept Software and becoming one of the UK's leading implementation consultancies for the likes of Oracle. He had been introduced by a friend on the school run who said he should look at Andrews' accounting software business. Shortly afterwards, Andrews spent two hours explaining to Stickley about large scale enterprise resource planning (ERP) – an area in which the serial entrepreneur had no experience. Once vendors had concluded software deals, Andrews would place people on site for up to two years and charge hundreds of thousands of pounds for implementation work. 'It was a world that blew my mind,' says Stickley. 'After 20 years, he told me, he realised he was part of the machine that was stacked against the customer, who was also getting mugged rather than it being implemented out of the box,' Stickley recalls of their first meeting. Read More: The boss who has found 'nature's answer to plastic' 'He said to me that he decided to build a better system by investing £1.5m of family savings and a friend who did the same. They carved off some engineers and created an accounting solution [iplicit] which could be deployed in days and compile reports in hours not weeks, with low disruption.' Stickley asked how many customers iplicit had, to which Andrews replied none. It was, however, the start of an unlikely relationship, given that Stickley would usually have refrained from any reckless decisions in previous investments. Having promised his friend, Stickley made some calls and was told to give it a wide berth. One final network call to a co-founder of legacy finance firm Exchequer, who he knew over 20 years previously, changed the direction. After looking at the software, he was left enthused by its power and low touch. With Stickley investing £1m into Andrews' business, iplicit swelled to around 20 staff, went to market in 2019 and immediately started winning top accountancy awards they hadn't entered. Iplicit's plan had been how to overcome the issue of customers buying finance software off an unknown player in the market. COVID not only levelled the playing field, with video meetings and iplicit's shorter implementation times, but also propelled the appeal from mounting customers who had non-cloud system issues. Iplicit realised that it could serve 100,000 sites, often multi-company locations, with a 25% market share goal and a £500m a year business. 'We couldn't have possibly contrived that [accounting software giant] Sage would drop a royal ball and not have something for the vast majority of its base,' says Stickley. The industry had also taken notice. Stickley was told by Oystein Moan – the executive chairman of Visma who took the company to unicorn status – that iplicit was a multi-million pound opportunity in the UK alone. Last year, Moan and Nic Humphries, one of the biggest private equity players in the business-to-business software space, joined iplicit's advisory board. Read More: 'Why we set up a sustainable mobile operator to save people money' Stickley's entrepreneurial spirit had been gained from his father, who had a chicken farm at 16, ran a nightclub in his twenties and worked with artists like Lulu and the Rolling Stones. Aged 17, Stickley junior took Wednesdays off sixth form college to sell kitchenware at the local market, earning £200. At university, he ran five club nights across Portsmouth in the late 1980s before his penchant for scaling businesses. 'The worst and the best I have been involved in is the most human connected and impactful business,' Stickley says of Kemnal Park, which he describes as the UK's first cemetery to celebrate life and built for people to return. 'The 'thank yous' were non stop,' he says, 'when you can see week in, week out people come back and be inspired by the place where they have buried a loved one.' Stickley met Andrews as the former was leaving the cemetery business, with iplicit planning for two years before launch. From 2006 to 2022, Stickley worked part-time three days a week. He took the helm as CEO when he realised that the business wouldn't be sold and is now working as if 'back in my twenties'. The firm has one office in Poole, Dorset with 25 employees, and around 135 working remotely. Stickley says iplicit's growth has been down to lifting the barriers of geography and has U-turned on seeing recruitment agencies as 'the enemy'. 'Getting a good recruitment pipeline means you have talent on tap when you need it,' Stickley adds. 'There's no way you can grow fast like this and do the recruitment function as you can't afford mediocrity to creep into the camp.' Iplicit's goal, he says, is to become the de facto standard in the UK before any entrance into the US. It currently serves over 43,000 daily users in over 3,000 organisations. 'We have the best tech, team and trajectory and an advantage that no one else has in the market right now,' he adds. All thanks to that school run chat and Andrews being a few months shy of running out of money before meeting iplicit's future CEO. 'What doesn't make him bonkers is he didn't go bust, so now he's a genius, right? Because he really was," says Stickley. "But if it had gone bust, he was bonkers. It was a fine line.' Coffee roulette and remote-first You value the relationships more when you don't have them on a plate every day. We get together six times a year and we all hug across 150 people as we aren't in the office getting bored with each other. The video efficiency is unbelievable. I can have 15 meetings in a day and include coffee roulette in that, which was invented by one of our techies where a random name generator pairs two people to have 20 minutes together. I found it so insightful I now have around 25 coffee roulettes a month virtually across the country. It takes the drudge out of the work and makes meetings more concise. We don't recruit younger people typically; they deserve a right of passage in an office. We are heavily biased towards over 35s as we suit the young families and older, experienced employees and appeal to an audience who don't want to commute. We measure trust by measuring outputs, not by checking in on people. Read more: The life lesson behind a 335-year-old funeral business? 'Never sleep on an argument' Meet the company that finds 'must-haves' to make everyday life easier Impossibrew CEO says Dragons' Den failure sparked alcohol-free brand's rise
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
iplicit garners $31m from One Peak
UK-based cloud accounting software provider iplicit has secured £25m ($31m) from growth equity firm One Peak. This is the software company's first external institutional funding round. One Peak's contribution will play a key role in expediting iplicit's product development and propelling its continued expansion efforts. iplicit CEO Lyndon Stickley said: 'This investment marks a pivotal milestone in iplicit's remarkable journey. Since our launch in 2019, we've achieved triple-digit revenue growth annually for six consecutive years. 'This new funding will enable us to sustain our momentum, continue delivering an exceptional experience for our customers, and solidify our position as the leading cloud accounting solution for the UK mid-market.' He added: 'The One Peak team is the latest addition to our all-star line-up of investors and advisors. We anticipate 2025 to be another breakthrough year as we expand our marketing efforts and partner network, recruiting top Sage and Advanced resellers and many of the UK's Top 50 accounting practices.' iplicit noted that its cloud-based platform offers advanced features, ensuring a smooth setup and migration process for clients looking to future-proof their financial operations. This is achieved at a 'fraction of the cost' and complexity of high-end systems, making it easy for businesses to scale, further claimed the company. One Peak co-founder and managing partner Humbert de Liederkerke Beaufort said: 'iplicit's award-winning, intelligent, powerful, and intuitive cloud accounting software, along with best-in-class customer support, makes it a standout leader in its category. 'This investment underscores our belief in iplicit's ability to continue disrupting the market by delivering transformative value to customers who are looking to move away from legacy on-premises vendors or have outgrown the limited functionality provided by entry-level accounting software solutions.' In July 2024, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) selected iplicit to run its finances. "iplicit garners $31m from One Peak" was originally created and published by International Accounting Bulletin, a GlobalData owned brand. The information on this site has been included in good faith for general informational purposes only. It is not intended to amount to advice on which you should rely, and we give no representation, warranty or guarantee, whether express or implied as to its accuracy or completeness. You must obtain professional or specialist advice before taking, or refraining from, any action on the basis of the content on our site. Sign in to access your portfolio
