The Forsyth Group – Executive Search

The Forsyth Group are very pleased to have placed the latest executive hires at Poq Commerce~Jonathan McKay, Chairman and Pim Piers, Board Advisor. More news coming soon on our search assignments with Poq.

Read the FULL article on UK Tech News »

We are so happy to have helped eMoov on their new hire of Lucy Milne as Chief Marketing Officer. We wish you continued success.

http://bit.ly/2eRJqUC

eMoov is one of the UK’s fastest growing  online estate agents. The company was founded in 2010 to disrupt the traditional estate agency model, and since then has sold over £3bn worth of properties, saved property sellers millions of pounds in fees, and has consistently been rated number one for customer service across all estate agents.

We are delighted to have helped DataCore with their new hire, Rosario Perri, Director of Strategic Partnerships & Alliances, EMEA. We wish you every success.

http://bit.ly/2rePYkl

DataCore Software is a leader in software-defined storage. The company’s storage virtualization software empowers organizations to seamlessly manage and scale their data storage architectures, delivering massive performance gains at a fraction of the cost of solutions offered by legacy storage hardware vendors. Backed by 10,000 customer sites around the world, DataCore’s adaptive and self-learning and healing technology takes the pain out of manual processes and helps deliver on the promise of the new software defined data center through its hardware agnostic architecture.

We are delighted to announce the appointment of Mike Williams as CEO at Pushfor.

Williams will be responsible for driving business development at Pushfor. He will also work closely with founder John Safa to secure additional investment and continued product roadmap development. Williams’ strong experience in sales and managing businesses for the past 25 years includes being Co-Founder and CEO of edge IPK which was subsequently acquired by Temenos in 2012. Williams then sat on the management board at the $500 million listed banking software company, Temenos.

John Safa, Pushfor’s CTO and founder, says: “We have ambitious growth plans for the future, with expansion into new markets and particularly the US and Asia. We needed a CEO with a track record in delivering business growth as Mike’s. He has co-founded two highly successful companies and secured millions in VC funding and so he brings the right experience and ambition to make Pushfor into the billion dollar company we want it to be.”

Williams says: “Pushfor is an exciting development in the content sharing and instant messaging space. To truly be able to control who, when, where and how people see your content, with the opportunity to pull or limit access at any time is a first. The interest from investors and customers speaks for itself so to be able to get involved in the next stage of its future was an amazing opportunity for me.”

Williams began his career at Cadre Technologies before working for Steve Jobs at Next Software to help launch WebObjects in the pioneering days of the internet. He then went on to found Entranet, growing revenues to £14m in three years and raising £21m in venture capital before managing the IPO process in 2000. On the back of his success with Entranet, Williams co-founded edge IPK.

http://bit.ly/2eP9FrW

 
About Pushfor:

Pushfor has created a secure content sharing and instant messaging platform that pushes, controls and tracks the distribution of any content type or size, automatically showing that content to fit any device. Its patented technology ‘pushes’ information to users, letting them view the content without physically sending it to them. Security and viewing permissions can be applied along with geo-location tracking. Users have instant and easy access to the content without the need of the authoring software on their device. Content can be removed by the originator at any time. If an unauthorised recipient tries to screenshot or download the content, viewing rights are pulled, so it can no longer be viewed. It is the brainchild of John Safa, serial entrepreneur and security expert.

The Forsyth Group, a leader in Executive Search for high-growth emerging technology companies, is excited to announce that pre-seed and seed stage investor Seedcamp has partnered with Nextlaw Labs, the innovative legal tech venture development platform launched by global law firm Dentons to co-sponsor early stage legal tech startups. Selected startups will receive training, mentorship, and investment from both Nextlaw Labs and Seedcamp.

“The Forsyth Group has always focused on investing in and adding value to the global tech community,” said Rosemary Forsyth, founder and managing partner of the Forsyth Group, “and I am delighted to have introduced Seedcamp and Nextlaw Labs. As an early investor in Seedcamp, I believe that the synergy with Nextlaw Labs will revolutionise the legal industry, which is ripe for technology innovation.”

“The formation of this partnership is another example of the value add that Seedcamp investors like the Forsyth Group bring to the table. We are looking forward to exploiting the technology opportunities in the legal space,” said Reshma Sohoni founding partner of Seedcamp.

Seedcamp, the leading pre-seed and seed stage investor in London, has built an impressive track record since its launch in 2007. The team has invested in more than 220 companies across multiple sectors from around the world, including startups such as TransferWise, Property Partner, and legal tech company, Apperio. To date, Seedcamp’s portfolio has raised more than $380 million in further funding, and14 of their portfolio have been acquired by companies such as AirBnB, BBVA, and GoPro.

Nextlaw Labs is a global collaborative innovation platform focused on developing, deploying, and investing in new technologies and processes to transform the practice of law around the world. Dentons is the lead supporter and investor in Nextlaw Labs, serving as the global testing ground for new products, services, and other ideas to be vetted, piloted and scaled. Following an application period where startups must apply, selected finalists will benefit from Seedcamp’s life-long platform of learning and support, which will be enhanced with mentorship from lawyers of the world’s largest law firm, Dentons. The chosen companies will gain in-house training and expert guidance on how to build their business, develop their brand and raise capital.

Founded in 1981, The Forsyth Group is a London headquartered international Executive Search boutique, committed to accelerating the growth of early stage high-growth technology companies. We have an extensive track record of sourcing commercially minded, ambitious, and driven executives at Board, CxO, VP and Director levels for emerging technology clients across the UK, EMEA and USA. Our team focuses on finding the best executive talent to fit the skills and experience requirements, as well as the cultural DNA of our clients.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2016/06/prweb13492632.htm

Is your high growth tech start-up based in Greece and are you thinking of expanding internationally?

If the answer to these questions is YES!, then you should sign up to attend Brett Putter’s fireside chat on  Wednesday the 29^th of June in Athens. Brett has 15 years experience helping European high growth technology start-ups expand their teams internationally and he will be hosting a discussion and networking event starting at 6:00pm at  at Starttech Ventures Likourgou 1, Athina 105 51, Greece.

Having most recently helped Greek companies like eFront and PollFish expand and grow their teams into the London and New York markets respectively, Brett will be discussing:

– The WAR FOR TALENT and the opportunities and challenges of hiring internationally
– How  to ensure that your start-up is able to recruit the best A+ talent in international markets.
– How to position your company against international competitors
– How to deal with the different cultural challenges of hiring internationally
– How to avoid common hiring pitfalls
– How to position your company to win the war for talent in international cities like Berlin, London, Stockholm, New York and San Francisco
– The critical importance of understanding your company’s culturalDNA and matching that in the right candidate

We look forward to seeing you there. Sign up to join us on the 29^th for a discussion and networking drinks/canapes afterwards.

Our founder, Rosemary Forsyth, spent yesterday at the House of Commons, for the launch of the new All Party Parliamentary Group for Entrepreneurship.

Launched by Business Secretary Sajid Javid, this cross-party group of MPs is designed to act as a bridge between entrepreneurs and policy-makers, to ensure that the voices of entrepreneurs are heard in parliament. In the first 12 months, the focus will be on 4 key areas of policy: tax reform, exporting, enterprise education, and female entrepreneurship.

Sajid Javid launches the APPG, with chair Alan Mak MP looking on

The new APPG will be chaired by Alan Mak MP, who emphasised the importance of collaboration between lawmakers and entrepreneurs, stating that “The new Entrepreneurship APPG will be a key bridge between Westminster policymakers and entrepreneurs across Britain.

“Economic growth driven by innovation, exports and educational excellence is at the top of the Government’s agenda, and I’m delighted Business Secretary Sajid Javid is reaffirming his commitment to entrepreneurship by launching our APPG.”

Merrill Corporation have announced that Alun Baker has joined the company as Managing Director Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA). Alun will be based in London, and his responsibilities will include strategy development and implementation, client service, product alignment and sales execution.

“Alun’s extensive operating experience in EMEA, knowledge of our products, and intense client focus make him a great addition to our EMEA leadership team,” said Rusty Wiley, President and CEO. “He has an outstanding track record of delivering exceptional client value and driving rapid growth in multiple EMEA businesses. He also has a rich set of experiences in developing and delivering SaaS solutions to clients. We are very excited to have Alun join the global leadership team.”

The Forsyth Group assisted Merrill Corporation with this search, viewing Alun’s extensive experience in the Information Technology sector, especially with US software firms, as perfect for the role.

Our Managing Partner for Emerging Growth Brett Putter gave a talk on “Building the right team for your high growth startup” on Tuesday night, for StartupBootCamp’s cohort of insurtech startups. This was followed by a Q&A session, in which the knowledge-hungry founders picked Brett’s brain, asking questions about how to give out equity, how to hire an ideal co-founder, and how to get an advisor to become a full-time employee.

Brett gave a number of great pieces of advice to the founders present, with 5 of the best summed up here:

1. Hire slow, fire fast – As a startup, your early team is so important that you don’t want to make mistakes, and if you do, you need to rectify them quickly.

2. Be flexible – As a startup you have an opportunity to react far quicker and change direction, as you aren’t constrained by the rules or traditions of a corporate.

3. Think about the balance of your team – If everyone is outgoing, it might be best to hire somebody more circumspect, and vice versa.

4. Cultural fit vs sales capability – When confronted by the decision to hire the very best salesmen, or somebody who fits your company culture better, always choose the cultural fit.

5. Mentors aren’t forever – Sometimes a mentor or advisor can be good for 6-12 months, then their value could diminish.