ABGF and Capsifi: Shaping a digital future

There’s a tipping point in the journey of most small-medium enterprises (SMEs). It’s that moment when your product or service is market-fit, and you realise the course you’ve taken to establish your position is different to the approach you need to expand your business into the future.

That’s the position Australian-built enterprise software company Capsifi found itself, in late 2021.

Founded in 2013, Capsifi had established a strong foothold in the market. The company had acquired a raft of blue-chip clients, and been awarded top rankings by influencial analysts. Yet the management team recognised that to accelerate growth, the approach they’d taken so far was unlikely to scale.

That’s when Capsifi reached out to the Australian Business Growth Fund (ABGF) via the online website enquiry form, to discuss the support they’d need for the next stage of growth — access to $11 million of patient growth capital and a global talent network.

Transforming business for the modern age

With an estimated annual global spend of $1.8+ trillion, digital transformation (DX) is fuelling the largest wave of technology investment of our time, and large organisations across the world are investing in enterprise architecture functions to effectively manage these transformations. Despite all this investment and focus, most transformation programs fail to deliver results.

Capsifi’s software-as-a-service (SaaS) product, Jalapeno, is designed to solve the issues faced by large and complex organisations when undergoing transformation. It’s centralised business architecture platform captures key information about an organisation’s strategy, capabilities, business processes and applications, to enable intelligent insights from the interplay between those layers. By connecting disparate information from across the organisation, business leaders can make informed choices from concept to execution. This provides a dynamic and interactive assessment of the impact transformation decisions have on functional areas.

Capsifi has gained extensive traction in its field. Its software has been adopted across domestic and international markets, with an enviable blue-chip client base including AMEX, AMP, Costco and IKEA among others. Having first appeared in the 2020 Gartner Magic Quadrant as the most visionary product in the category for Enterprise Architecture Software, by November 2021 Capsifi was the biggest mover in the report, catapulted into the leader quadrant. Off the back of Capsifi’s momentum in the market, it was ready for the next phase of growth.

 

Capsifi founder and CEO, Dr Terry Roach, has decades of experience designing and implementing enterprise technology applications for large and complex organisations. With academic grounding of a doctorate in information systems from UNSW, Capsifi was born from developing a solution for their inaugural client, Service NSW.

“We’re extremely passionate about this business,” he says. “From our combined experience, we knew there was a universal problem – consolidating disconnected and disjointed business knowledge. Capsifi was designed to deliver real time intelligent insights into the inner workings of an organisation.”

ABGF’s co-head of investment, Ghazaleh Lyari, will take a position on the Capsifi board. “Capsifi is an Australian software development success story, with great opportunities for expansion domestically and globally,” she says. “We are excited to invest in an innovative Australian business which we believe will become a global leader.”

A physical and digital partnership

Capsifi’s ambition to scale the business required a new strategic direction, and a level of investment beyond what the company could realistically fund itself. They knew they needed an equity partner to complement their relationship with St. George Bank, as accessing debt was not a viable option at this stage of growth.

Being purpose-built to back ambitious businesses to grow, ABGF presented a clear pathway for Capsifi to not only gain access to patient growth capital, but also the benefits from an active investor who would help them re-imagine their go-to-market strategy.

“After considering several investment opportunities, we decided ABGF was the right fit for us,” says Dr Roach. “The appeal came from its unique philosophy on nurturing and building the businesses it invests in, rather than taking them over. We have been very impressed by the careful and mutual consideration we have experienced from ABGF, with a clear focus on making sure the growth potential of the business is realised.”

ABGF’s $11 million minority investment and active position on the board will enable Capsifi to accelerate product development and innovation, expand its presence internationally, and further invest in its technology talent. The nature of the investment also enables Capsifi to retain control of its own expansion strategy.

Can ABGF assist your business?

At the Australian Business Growth Fund™, we provide long-term growth capital to enable SMEs to scale without giving up control of their business. Start the conversation with us today.

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