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"Most firms we spoke with would say they knew people in this industry or that. In the end, we found that Fidelity Growth Partners Europe were the ones that could open the doors for us." Kevin O'Leary, CEO, Qumas
Strategic support at Qumas
Qumas is a provider of world class compliance software. Their products deliver a closed-loop compliance model to standardize and integrate the common elements of compliance tasks across the organization. This enables enterprises to converge compliance programs onto a single platform resulting in overall reduced compliance costs.
With a proven track record that spanned 10 years of service to this industry, CEO Kevin O'Leary was looking for ways to expand their presence into other highly regulated industries and global markets.
O'Leary understood that moving from one market into a series of new markets is not a simple transition. He knew that it required organizational transformation that included a shift in culture, thinking and structure. According to O'Leary, "Qumas had become set in our ways in life sciences. We really needed depth in terms of other marketplaces, a way of thinking that gave us new dimensions, new areas of growth." In order to succeed in this endeavor they needed an equity partner with the patience, the knowledge and the credibility to help them expand beyond their current market position.
Making the Case for Compliance
Fidelity Ventures conducted an internal research project to identify how companies manage compliance in heavily regulated industries. Simon Clark, partner at FGPE, spearheaded this initiative because he recognized that compliance was a major issue within corporate organizations. As he further delved into the industry he wanted to understand if anyone had successfully tackled the issues surrounding compliance.
Clark explains how he identified Qumas as a potential portfolio company, "We knew that if we could find a really comprehensive system that could help compliance departments run their businesses more efficiently from an enterprise perspective, we would want to invest. There were lots of little systems that were solving little problems with little ambition. And then we found Qumas." Qumas had a comprehensive system, a full product suite, an impressive team of people who knew the ins and outs of the industry and an established customer base. And most importantly, they were ambitious.
Envision It, Execute On It and Ideally They Will Follow
The executive team at Qumas had spent considerable time speaking with venture capital companies. They knew that they would have to work closely with the people at the company that they partnered with and they focused their efforts on identifying a partner that could provide more than just capital. "Most firms we spoke with would say they knew people in this industry or that, or that they have clients who know someone and that they would introduce us to those people. In the end, we found that Fidelity Growth Partners were those people. They were the ones that could open the doors for us," recalls O'Leary. In addition, the expertise and compelling presence in the financial services industry that the broader Fidelity organization brought to the table, was appealing to Qumas as this was their next perceived area of opportunity.
Fidelity Growth Partners was incredibly excited about the partnership with Qumas and because they believed in the products and vision, Fidelity invested in Qumas from a customer perspective and became their first, franchise, financial services customer. As a result of this relationship, both Qumas and Fidelity Growth Partners expected other companies to follow their lead.
What Clark and O'Leary didn't count on was that they were ahead of the curve. So together they had to retrench, rethink and find a different way of penetrating the financial services market. Together they had to build a new set of partnerships to help them access the financial institutions that were not as quick to build a compliance offering.
Once the Market Was Ready, We Were There
With the help of Fidelity Growth Partners, Qumas went on to grow their customer base to over 250,000 users across 29 countries. On the financial services side, they count the "Big Three" financial titans in asset management, wealth management and investment as their customers. When thinking back about the initial hurdles they overcame in order to scale to this magnitude, O'Leary acknowledges that, "It was an interesting way to test the relationship. This journey is going to take a littler longer. It's going to be a bit painful. But the patience and understanding of Fidelity Growth Partners was really their greatest talent. They clearly demonstrated that they could help us take the company from a strong vertical to a horizontal position."
Now with its proven track record in two of the of the most stringently regulated industries - financial services and life sciences - Qumas has proven that it is best positioned to provide centralized compliance for any company, regardless of industry.