Appointments

Interface

Professor Andrea Nolan has been appointed Chair of Interface Strategic Board, taking over from Professor Sir Pete Downes. University Principal and Vice-Chancellor of Edinburgh Napier University and Convener of Universities Scotland, Professor Nolan is a strong champion of business-academic collaborations.

Dr Siobhán Jordan, Director of Interface, welcomed the appointment: “Professor Nolan brings a wealth of experience which will greatly help Interface in its quest to enable more business-academic collaborations. I look forward to working with her and the other members of the board in bringing the strategic vision and our developing plans to reality. We were very fortunate to have Professor Pete Downes as chair of the board for five years leading us to grow and adapt in an ever changing political and social environment and I would like to take this opportunity to thank him for his tremendous input.

Working with Professor Nolan, we can draw on her experiences, so we can continue to add value to the economy and society fulfilling our ambitions to have a catalytic influence on the Scottish Government’s vision as a “nation with ambition”, with Scotland designing and making the products of the future, boosting the economy and creating jobs.”

Professor Nolan said: “I look forward to my term of office as the new Chair of Interface Strategic Board.  The Interface team working alongside universities, research institutes and colleges are key to ensuring that the sectors continue to make an ongoing contribution to Scotland’s economic success. I am passionate about building closer relationships between businesses and universities and the potential impact that these partnerships have on business, third sector and people across the world.”

Interface is now calling for up to four new members to join its Strategic Board. The Interface Strategic Board is formed of representatives from industry, partner university and research institutes, funders of knowledge exchange, and other relevant organisations that support business – academic engagement.

ThinkAnalytics

ThinkAnalytics has appointed Simon McGrath as COO and SVP of the EMEA and Asia Pacific regions.

Simon brings 30 years’ experience in the TV technology sector with a pedigree in business development and commercial strategy. He joins from Deluxe Entertainment Services where he was SVP of strategy and business development; prior to that he was European managing director at thePlatform, now Comcast Technology Solutions. Simon also previously served as CMO and commercial director for Europe at SeaChange International and as deputy CEO of On Demand Group until SeaChange acquired the business.

Simon said: “ThinkAnalytics’ use of AI, machine learning and elastic compute capacity is bringing real benefits through better product placement and content discovery, while providing aggregators, super-aggregators, network operators and service providers with better insight and real-time intelligence. With ThinkAnalytics’ breadth of product in discovery and analytics, it is a very exciting time to the join the company.”

Eddie Young, the Chairman of ThinkAnalytics said: “Following a significant increase in new customer wins in the Americas, Europe and Asia, we have bolstered our executive team with the addition of Simon. Like Gabriel Berger, our recently appointed CEO, Simon brings a deep understanding of technology, business operations and customer engagement. This marks yet another important milestone in ThinkAnalytics’ growth.”

Tag Games

Dundee development studio Tag Games has named its director of development Marc Williamson the new CEO. Co-founder and fomer CEO Paul Farley will now headup the live operations platform ChilliConnect, which was created by the team at Tag and spun out as a separate company in 2017. Farley will remain as chairman of Tag.

Farley now aims to take expand ChilliConnect’s operations with the goal of “democratising live ops and connected gaming” through a single SDK/dashboard for developers and publishers. Farley told DIGIT: “Growing Tag from three people to become the awesome and respected development studio it is today has been an equally challenging and rewarding experience,”

“With a wealth of talent and experience at Tag, I’m in an enviable position of being able to pass the day to day management of the studio to Marc and a very capable team around him. My focus now moves to a very exciting opportunity with ChilliConnect as we aim to become the leading platform for live ops and connected gameplay.”

Williamson said: “I’m proud and privileged to be taking the helm at Tag Games. Whilst it is business as usual, I will be looking to further strengthen the team and develop our culture of innovation and excellence. The development teams at Tag are incredibly talented and I’m looking forward to helping provide them with many new opportunities to showcase their skills whilst growing the business during this new phase.”

Future iQ

Future iQ Europe has announced the appointment of a new VP of UK Business Development within its European Operations with effect from 1st March 2018.

Steve Turner has joined the business in its first major appointment in the UK.

Steve is an accomplished Board Advisor and new markets specialist who has led several high growth and value building projects across sectors including Consultancy, Engineering, IT / Software, Consumer Goods, Hospitality and Construction.

Celine Beurle, Chief Operating officer of Future iQ said: “We have seen a significant shift within the UK in recent years. Fundamental changes within the commercial and political spheres have led to a shift in both the attitude and the urgency with which Future planning and foresight is approached in the Public and Private sectors. Having focused predominantly on the US market in recent years, we are delighted to be able to appoint Steve in our first major UK investment.”

FreeAgent

Accounting software solutions provider, FreeAgent, has appointed Nick Longden as VP of Sales. Formerly VP Fintech, Mobile & Connected Devices at Mobica, Nick will be responsible for maximising growth and further boosting FreeAgent’s reputation in the accountancy practice sector.

Nick’s appointment at FreeAgent comes after a two-decade long career in the accounting software industry, where he has worked for major companies including Sage, Xero, CCH and Pegasus.

Ed Molyneux, Founder and CEO of FreeAgent, commented: “We are delighted to welcome Nick as our new VP of Sales. A veteran of the accounting software industry, Nick was involved at the very start of the cloud and SaaS revolution and has worked with some of the leading names in the industry. With over 25 years’ industry experience his credentials speak for themselves and his experience will be invaluable as we execute on our growth plans.

“With Nick at the forefront of our sales team, alongside Kevin McCallum who steps into the new role of Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) to lead our efforts in the Open Banking and wider FinTech space, we are doubling down on our support for these important channels to introduce even more business owners and their accountants to the benefits of FreeAgent in the coming years.”

Criton Apps

Growing travel tech firm Criton has appointed Roz Hewitson in the new role of Product Manager. Roz will be instrumental in ensuring that the development of the UK’s first DIY app builder for the hospitality sector maintains its competitive advantage and responds to the needs of the market.

Ms Hewitson, who joined the company in March, was previously a Senior Project Manager at Realise, where she managed multimillion pound projects for a wide range of clients; from business transformation to large scale UX, design and technical builds.

Following the announcement of a £5 million investment in November 2017, Criton has grown significantly and now employs 18 with staff levels expected to rise to 24 by the end of May.

Julie Grieve, founder and CEO of Criton, said: “This is a very exciting time for Criton as we build a strong team with extensive industry experience to meet our global ambitions. I am delighted that Roz is joining our team. She has previously managed large-scale projects with high profile clients and I am excited to be working with her as Criton continues to grow through her knowledge of digital development and transformation.”

Roz added: “Criton is at the forefront of guest-centric travel tech and this is a fantastic time to join the company. The future potential for our products is significant and my role is to ensure that we will continue to be ahead of the game and respond to our customers’ needs.”

Converged Communication Solutions

Aberdeen-based Converged Communication Solutions has bolstered its business development team with the appointment of Steve Smith who joins the firm in the newly created role of business development manager.  He brings over 20 years of experience to the post, which includes time with large multinational companies Xerox and Apple.

Steve’s role at Converged will see him lead its business development team as the firm targets continued growth across Scotland.  Spearheading that expansion has been the investment Converged has made in strengthening the scope of its Internet service offering.

Steve told DIGIT “Converged has steadily built a strong name for itself across Scotland for providing a quality service that is backed-up by a knowledgeable technical support team.  It is clear that Converged is a very customer focused business, illustrated by the way in which it has widened its range of Internet connection options, and it is great to be joining a company which takes that approach.”

Neil Christie, Converged’s managing director, said: “We are very pleased that Steve has chosen to join Converged.  He is well respected in the IT industry and brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to our business development team and will provide a valuable contribution to help us achieve our growth targets.”

Scottish Business Resilience Centre

The Scottish Business Resilience Centre (SBRC) has recruited its first Chief Operating Officer. Lynsae Tulloch joins the organisation from a senior corporate affairs position at SSE.

Prior to that, Lynsae worked with the NHS as a programme consultant, where her responsibilities included digital transformation projects for the National Services Scotland and developing a framework for social media crisis response. A journalist to trade and Chartered Marketer, Lynsae’s 20 years of strategic experience, marketing knowledge and commercial success in both the public and private sector is welcomed at an exciting time of growth and expansion for the SBRC.

Lynsae told DIGIT: “Business resilience has never been so challenging – especially for SMEs which make up the backbone of Scotland’s economy. This is a fast-paced, ever-changing landscape with major opportunities so it’s fantastic to join SBRC at this time. I was already aware of the brilliant work the Centre delivers as a trusted advisor through its experienced seconded police and fire personnel working with a very proactive Board of business and resilience experts.

“My ambition is to further develop our strategic approach to business support and to strengthen our growing suite of services and advice to our various stakeholders.”

Mandy Haeburn-Little, Chief Executive of the Scottish Business Resilience Centre, said: “Lynsae is a fantastic appointment to assist us throughout and beyond this period of growth for the organisation. Her previous experience, using a wide range of skills to build meaningful relationships with key partners while harnessing untapped opportunities, will stand her in good stead to help us reach out to new markets.

“Those same skills will help Lynsae to communicate with our current members and the wider business community on potential challenges and issues, from traditional public safety, to lone working, to cyber security.”

Expansions

Head Resourcing

Recruitment specialist Head Resourcing is opening a new office in Manchester as part of a national growth strategy to expand the business in England. The company, which is based in Edinburgh and has offices in Glasgow and Leeds, supplies contract and permanent staff within IT, digital and business change to a variety of companies throughout the UK.

The Manchester office, located in the Spinningfields area of the city, will officially open on 5th March 2018 and will be headed up by Regional Director, Jon Musgrave, who is responsible for driving the company’s growth in the north of England.

Recruitment is underway to initially appoint five new people in Manchester, including a Managing Consultant, a Senior Consultant, two Consultants and an Admin Support.

Jon Musgrave, Regional Director at Head Resourcing said: “Over the past three years, we have seen a marked increase in our client portfolio, with a number of new clients based in the north west of England.  This client demand has driven our decision to open an office in Manchester.  Manchester has a great talent pool of professional recruiters, meaning we can grow an expert team here and tap into the wealth of opportunity the local market offers.  The city has a booming digital economy and the tech sector has huge growth potential, with more fintech companies choosing the city and surrounding areas as their base.”

Huw Martin, Managing Director at Head Resourcing added: “The new office marks a significant step in our ambitious plans to drive growth across the north of England.  This is an incredibly exciting phase for us and we look forward to being part of Manchester’s thriving business community.”

Unifii

Unifii is opening of a new office located in Edinburgh. The new office will be managed by Paul Donnelly, Consulting Lead.
Steve Mamelok, Director of Unifii, told DIGIT: “Expansion into Scotland is an exciting new chapter for the company. It celebrates the recent growth of the business and provides us with a new location to better serve customers in Northern England, Scotland and Ireland (NESI).”

Paul Donnelly, Consulting Lead, said: “The opening represents an important milestone in Unifii’s latest growth and we are excited to expand our network further into NESI.”

Unifii began its journey under the name Service Integrators in March 2010. When relaunched in July 2015, the business started to grow rapidly. Unifii hired its very first employee in May 2016, and a year later, expanded into NESI. Shortly after, a sales team was brought on board to help support and grow our business network.

In January 2018 the Unifii name came into existence. The rebrand was the next step in an evolution to embody our focus on innovation, implementation and integration. After recently opening offices in both Scotland and India, our team is now comprised of 23 employees in London, three in Edinburgh and three in India.

Zonefox

Cybersecurity user and entity behaviour analytics (UEBA) company ZoneFox is building a new sales team in London, as demand for the company’s machine learning-based security service grows in areas including financial services and law.

Alex Whiteley, an experienced sales manager will head up the new team. Alex has held previous sales positions held at the likes of Tufin, Extrahop Networks and Cognosec, all focused on cyber security and infrastructure protection. Alex has been working from London for six months, leading the sales effort as ZoneFox looks to secure a greater proportion of the London market.

Mark Tucker has also joined ZoneFox in the last three weeks to work alongside Alex as a regional sales manager. Mark brings a wealth of cybersecurity experience from the likes of McAfee, RSA and Thales eSecurity. He will be closely assisting Alex in order to approach and work with key companies throughout the capital.

Neil Cooper, Chief Commercial Officer, said: “We work with some of the biggest companies in Scotland and our technology has clear benefits when compared to others in our space. Due to this, we don’t want to stop at the level of being a national business; we want to continue to grow the company and provide security and compliance for as many companies as we can. Alex has done a terrific job so far with business in London and Mark has made a flying start too; we’re really excited about what we can achieve in the city and look forward to continuing our work there.”

SThree

STEM recruitment specialist SThree is opening a new centre of excellence in Glasgow which will bring together SThree’s UK support services, creating over 200 jobs in Glasgow over the course of 2018.

Founded in London in 1986, SThree provides specialist contract and permanent recruitment services in the STEM industries (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) and operates across 40 offices, in 16 countries around the world.

Alex Smith, SThree’s chief financial officer, said: “Investing in Glasgow gives us access to a highly-skilled workforce and an excellent business infrastructure.

“The STEM markets in which we operate are growing rapidly and this new centre in Glasgow will strengthen our operational capability and support expanding teams across our main markets. Our new centre of excellence will bring together our UK support services and underpin our future business needs in the most efficient way. With this move we also look forward to extending to Glasgow the actions of the SThree Foundation, which helps youth from underprivileged and diverse backgrounds get into the Stem industries.”

Scotland’s Economy Secretary Keith Brown said: “This facility will be a major jobs boost for Glasgow, with 200 new posts this year and 314 in total over the next three years. And it will support our ambition for Scotland to be a STEM nation with our economy at the forefront of the technological frontier.

“The £2 million funding from Scottish Enterprise also gives them access to the excellent business support network here in Scotland. Our communities will benefit from the work of the innovative SThree Foundation which supports young people from underprivileged and diverse backgrounds to transition successfully into Stem higher education, jobs and apprenticeships.”

SThree reported revenues of £1.1 billion in 2017, up 9% on the previous year.

Relocations

thinkWhere

Geographic and mapping technology company thinkWhere has moved to new headquarters in CodeBase Stirling.

thinkWhere isthe creator of one of the first cloud-based platforms for Open Source Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The company works with organisations including the British Library, Scottish Government, Balfour Beatty, Registers of Scotland and humanitarian charities in the US and Cambodia.

The company recently launched theMapCloud, a pioneering platform that makes managing and sharing maps and geographic information easy.

CodeBase Stirling is the heart of a rapidly expanding, regional technology ecosystem. As a result of the move thinkWhere will have access to first class office and meeting space as well as business mentorship, investment support and the chance to be part of community of like-minded visionaries and creative industries.

Alan Moore, CEO of thinkWhere, said: “This is not just about a new office. CodeBase offers much more than just the chance to physically expand the business. By locating within CodeBase we are aligning ourselves with some of the most innovative, creative and ambitious tech companies in Scotland. Occupying the same space, both geographically and culturally, we hope to develop truly symbiotic relationships within the CodeBase environment.”

Awards & Honours

Burness Paull

Law firm Burness Paull LLP has been named the United Kingdom (Scotland) Contentious Firm of the Year at the 14th Annual IP Awards, held at the The Savoy Hotel, London in March 2018.

The firm’s contentious IP practice has acted in more than 70% of all actions raised in the Scottish Intellectual Property Court, which includes securing wins in the most significant patent and trade mark cases heard in Scotland last year.

Colin Hume, who leads the practice, said: “Securing this prestigious accolade has been a long term goal for the practice.

“It is recognition of the tremendous progress made by the team not just in the last year, but in recent years.  Our ambitious objective is to be recognised as the leading IP practice in Scotland and this award is an important step on the way to achieving that.”

The firm has acted to protect the brands of famous names such as Harris Tweed and Sky Sports. The protection of confidential information and trade secrets is also an important element of its work, especially for clients in the ultra-competitive Oil & Gas sector.

“The team have the privilege of working with some of the best Scottish and Global clients and, of course, this award could not have been secured without their continued support and trust in us. We have ambitious plans to continue to add to our client roster and to our team, and winning this award will help us do so.”

Topolytics

Topolytics, a leading specialist in waste data analytics has been invited to join the Circular Economy 100 (CE100), an innovation programme established by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation to enable organisations to develop new opportunities and realise their circular economy ambitions faster.

Edinburgh-based Topolytics’ award-winning technology platform maps and tracks industrial and commercial waste flows from source to processing.

Topolytics’ can handle and analyse inputs from spreadsheets and sensors, offering valuable insights that allow waste managers in industry to make better cost, environmental and investment decisions.

The World Bank estimates that there will be 2bn tonnes of urban waste generated globally in a few years and most of this will be landfilled.

Dr Michael Groves, Topolytics CEO, said: “CE100 validates our leading position in the growing £1.5bn ‘smart waste’ sector. We are turning waste into a high value resource by mapping the generation and movement of the world’s commercial and industrial waste.

“Seeing where waste is and where it goes, is the first step to making better decisions about how it is managed and reduced.

Take the decision  by China to ban the import of low grade plastics and paper, for example. What now happens to this waste and where should it be processed?”

Scottish Government

The Scottish Government’s Collaborative Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Procurement team has been shortlisted for the Innovation Award in the 2018 World Procurement Awards for its work on launching the Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) for Digital Services.

It is the second year in a row the team has been nominated for the awards.

On a blog post, the DPS team said: “It feels like a long time since Derek Mackay, Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Constitution, launched the DPS at the National Procurement Conference back in October 2018.

“Since then over 260 suppliers have joined the DPS and this number is growing every week. Early on this year, it was great to see the first wave of call-off contracts being awarded. It was also fantastic to see those contracts being awarded to SMEs.

“Closing the digital skills gap and supporting cyber resilience are some of our main digital aspirations. When creating the DPS, we originally set out to create a system that was SME friendly at the same time as being digitally agile.

“It’s exciting to be nominated for the award but it’s just as good to see our hard work come to fruition. Suppliers can continue to join the DPS at any time and build on the wealth of experience already available to public sector organisations looking for digital services solutions. This is only the beginning for the opportunities being made available by DPS for Digital Services.”

SHE Software

International fresh produce company, G’s, lifted the coveted ‘agriculture, food and beverages’ award at the recent Verdantix HSE Innovation awards in London following the successful implementation of SHE Software’s cutting edge health and safety software.

In 2014, G’s introduced the Assure platform from SHE Software to tackle lack of consistency in reporting incidents, gaps in visibility and a time-consuming paper based reporting system.

Since using the software, G’s has seen its health and safety culture change dramatically. Incident reporting has improved, substantially increasing its near miss reporting, improving its incident management and improving real time communication. As a part of G’s cultural development, this new software has helped record over 7,000 behavioural conversations.

Matthew Elson, CEO of SHE Software, said: “We are delighted to see G’s lift this award. It’s a true testament to how important G’s regards the health and safety of its large global workforce.

“It has been fantastic to see the impact that Assure has had on G’s as a business. Our software has helped them to foster a positive and inclusive health and safety culture that offers consistency when managing, monitoring, tracking and reporting on health and safety across the whole organisation.”

John Boyle, Head of Health, Safety & Risk at G’s said: “Safety is at the forefront of everything we do, getting our people home safe every night is our top priority and we are proud to receive industry recognition for the work we have done.

“By giving all employees access to SHE Software’s Assure we have effectively improved the way we communicate, manage and share information. The software is helping in our objective to give every person in the company a health and safety voice.

“We have improved the visibility of safety performance at a companywide level and Assure has given our management teams the opportunity to analyse trends and identify risks, while significantly reducing the administrative burden that comes with traditional health and safety reporting.”

Ecometrica

Ecometrica, the downstream space and satellite mapping company, has been included on Inc.’s prestigious 5000 Europe list (at no. 2747), which ranks the fastest-growing privately held companies in Europe.

The firm was also shortlisted in the GP Bullhound Northern Tech Awards, which recognises the fastest growing exceptional technology companies in the North of England and Scotland.

Gary Davis, chief executive of Ecometrica, said: “The recognition by both Inc. 5000 Europe and GP Bullhound’s Northern Tech Awards is further validation for Ecometrica and our talented team.

“What is most pleasing for me is that our growth is not at the cost of the planet or its resources. In fact the more we grow the more we are helping business, governments and society to understand, monitor and protect our planet’s resources for the benefit of existing and future generations.

“Huge advances in raw cloud-based computing power, machine learning and artificial intelligence, coupled with steep cost reductions for deploying sensors on the ground, on UAVs or in orbit, mean that we are now able to harness the power of earth observation data at ever greater spatial and temporal resolutions.

“One example of the kind of solutions we provide, based on our unique geospatial technology stack, is our Forests 2020 project, as part of the UK Space Agency’s International Partnership Programme, where we are helping a number of governments to manage and protect over 300 million hectares of tropical forests much more effectively.”