Münich based Trivium is a leading provider of end-to-end consulting, software development and Industrial IoT solutions. Dutch based Sycade is a software development firm specializing in Cloud solutions, Industrial IoT and Machine Vision with a focus on the Microsoft stack. This synergic combination will provide unique and innovative digital solutions for current and new customers in the Benelux, Germany, Switzerland and the rest of Europe.

Initially BurntOak Benelux acted as an M&A broker for Trivium, selecting potential acquisition candidates in the Benelux. During the following phases the BurntOak team coordinated and managed the M&A process up to the successful completion early June 2024.

For further information please contact René Baas (rene.baas@burntoak-partners.com)

Jan Bouman – Senior partner at Burnt Oak Partners Benelux – has written an article about this development. In this article he describes the consequences for the traditional IT companies and outlines possible survival strategies.

Further details read the full article here

Download the article ]]> https://burntoak-partners.com/digital-agility-the-it-operat-ing-model-as-business-strategy/ Wed, 02 Nov 2022 15:10:18 +0000 https://burntoak-partners.com/?p=2660 Under the pressure of geopolitical turmoil, accelerating inflation, an energy crise and a likely business downturn, businesses must cope with a continued high pace of change. This requires new capabilities since customer demand and behavior will alter as well. Continued digital transformation and establishing business agility are two of the main responses required to meet the ongoing disruption.

Further details read the full report here

Download the white paper ]]> https://burntoak-partners.com/burnt-oak-partners-introduce-an-extended-ict-ma-offering/ Wed, 11 Aug 2021 19:39:57 +0000 https://burntoak-partners.com/?p=2594 With its roots in ICT outsourcing and based on deep market insights Burnt Oak Partners now introduce an extended M&A offering.

The services portfolio is directed towards both Corporate finance firms, Private equity players and the IT vendor community. The offering is truly end-to-end and includes strategic advisory, due diligence to post-merger integration services.

Over the years our Partners and Associates have managed 25+ M&A assignments and stand ready to assist your organization in your next M&A venture.

Our Consultants are all former ICT industry executives with 30+ years of experience from the Nordic ICT Industry. We deliver structured and packed services in pragmatic ways and our customers engage us to meet their objectives and to realize benefits – not just to run a process.

Further details can be found here

Motion5 puts entire organizations in motion towards improved commercial results through a complete approach of training and coaching on strategy and vision, process and structure, skills, mindset and leadership. By joining efforts, a broader offering becomes available with the focus on improvement on the entire sales process effectiveness. Motion5’s ambition is to break through in the dynamic ICT market, an arena in which Burnt Oak Partners has extensive leadership experience.

“Burnt Oak Partners is well positioned to guide complex ICT engagements where the focus is on sharpening the communication and negotiations with senior decision makers, this connects very well to the Motion5 sales programs” says Peter Overakker, partner at Burnt Oak.

“Under the motto ‘A Sales State Of Mind’, Motion5 not only targets individual growth but improves commercial results of the entire organization, by using our Lead2Contract and Sportsman opportunity management programs” add Peter Rademakers, founder at Motion5.

More information at www.motion5.com and www.burntoak-partners.com

Burnt Oak Partners seek to rebuild the value of the relationship through its sourcing approach and innovative contracting philosophy. 

Why?

Outsourcing in the first decade of the millennia lost its way. The previous two decades of outsourcing have seen a change from transactional first and second generation outsources to financially engineered vehicles that deliver a wide range of service models. Many of these outsourcing deals have demonstrably not worked for a multitude of reasons. This has driven the market to an SLA culture and more restrictive contracts, resulting in a downward spiral of flexibility and customer satisfaction.  This has also driven relationships to a new low whereby customers believe the value in the relationship has eroded to the point of exasperation on both sides. The loss of relationship materially affects the effectiveness of the outsource.

Figure 1 Value lost from relationships source James Gardiner formerly of LTSB

This has led to outsourcing being perceived as a commodity exercise delivering little value to the customer. This in turn drives customers towards concentrating on reducing costs rather than generating value to their businesses. 

At Burnt Oak UK&I, we have successfully demonstrated that the right sourcing approach combined with collaborative relationship constructs delivers a sustainable model that regenerates the value of the relationship. We do this through a collaborative model with a strong focus on business involvement and creating a more flexible value chain. Burnt Oak won 3 GSA awards in 2018 for a project that challenged the status quo. 

If you would like to know more or just discuss the concept, contact William.mills@burntoak-partners.com

• Utilities Project of the Year
• Innovation Project of the Year
• Excellence in Collaboration. 

Project Context

Scottish Water envisaged a strategy to become a digitally enabled organisation to drive business value and improve customer experience for both employees and consumers. Implementing this digital strategy encompassed two key challenges:

• Re-invent Scottish Water to be agile and collaborative, with outcome-based practices, capabilities and behaviours.
• Select two strategic partners with appetite to work collaboratively, driving innovation as ‘one team’ with Scottish Water to execute the strategy as a digital partnership.

“We are proud of our role in the success of the Scottish Water project, says David Downs, Burnt Oak Partners UK&I. Moving away from the traditional RFP based approach, we adopted an innovative process that focussed on collaboration, culture and commercial / contractual flexibility. As a result, Scottish Water selected strategic partners that have ‘hit the ground’ running, working collaboratively with eachother and Scottish Water, building on relationships established during the selection process, and are already delivering real business value”.

View the full list of winners here.

About the GSA
The Global Sourcing Association (GSA) is the industry association and professional body for the global sourcing industry. We are the home of the Global Sourcing Standard, a world first for the provision of a portfolio of best practice methodologies and accreditation programmes supported by both buyers and suppliers of sourcing. The GSA is a not-for-profit membership association which serves to share best practice, trends and connections across the globe bringing the global community together in a wholly interactive manner for the first time. Its overriding objective is the ongoing development and dissemination of the Standard and supporting portfolio of qualifications in order to improve the benefits and positive reputation, and therefore size, of the global sourcing industry.

Bankgirot in Sweden continues to meet increasing customer demands in the payment market. Referring to the official announcement Bankgirot initiates a new partnership and outsources IT operations to EVRY to ensure and secure an efficient payment services in the future.

The partnership means that EVRY will provide the operation and management of Bankgirot’s payment platforms. The outsourcing also includes about 30 employees to be transferred to EVRY. The agreement has a seven year duration.

Burnt Oak Partners took an active role in helping Bankgirot to find the right partner.

“Being an independent sourcing advisor we are able to deliver tangible and lasting value for our clients, says Anders Svensson, Burnt Oak Partners. We were able to use our experience to help Bankgirot select the right sourcing strategy and to find the right vendor to realize expected results.”

Amsterdam, May 23rd 2018

– IT Sourcing Consultancy Burnt Oak Partners launches MAITA Services (M&A IT Assessments). Objective of this service is to improve the quality and effectiveness of M&A transactions for both buyers and sellers. The maturity and quality of the Information Technology has a significant impact on the success of mergers and acquisitions. However IT often gets little attention or is even completely overlooked in the process.

“Most M&A transactions focus on financial and legal aspects. Much attention is paid to revenues, commercial contracts, costs, liabilities etcetera. Although it is of vital importance for most companies Information Technology gets little attention or is considered too late in the process. Legacy systems, poor maintenance or non-matching IT systems can be real showstoppers for a transaction” states Peter Overakker, partner at Burnt Oak Partners Benelux.

Burnt Oak Partners has in-depth Industry knowledge, a long track record in conducting IT Due Diligence and the ability to link Business and IT. Recently the company was involved in the successful acquisition of the Dutch company Vanderlande Industries – worldwide known for their advanced baggage handling systems – by Japanese Toyota Industries Corporation. Burnt Oak Partners also helped several IT companies select acquisition targets in Benelux and Scandinavia, and was closely involved in selling and carving out non-strategic IT parts for clients.

Rene Baas, one of the other partners, stresses the importance of a professional and early IT assessment “IT is crucial for the integration of business processes of merging companies. An early assessment of the IT environments allows the parties to plan the carve-out and integration more accurately, which has a direct impact on achieving the expected business benefits of a transaction. It also helps identify and mitigate IT-related risks and avoid unforeseen costs.”

What is the focus of Burnt Oak Partners during IT Due Diligence? Jan Bouman – the third Benelux partner – states: “In a structured way we investigate all aspects determining the quality of IT. This includes the maturity of the IT organization, the way IT supports the business, the stability and sustainability of the IT landscape and the cost of IT. Specific attention is paid to software licenses, outsourcing contracts, security and compliance, but also disaster recovery and IT governance are covered. In short, our DD approach covers all aspects with a potential impact on the transaction, the risks involved and the planned disentanglement and post-transaction integration. Preferably we conduct a high-level IT assessment in an early phase followed by a comprehensive DD before the transaction is closed. This 2-step approach enables better scoping and planning and helps identify the business critical IT elements in an early stage.”

The introduction of this service by Burnt Oak Partners is well timed. Not only is IT considered critical for a successful transaction, but also the increasing strategic importance of Information Technology drives more and more M&A transactions. A study of Ernst & Young revealed that almost 50% of the interviewed 220 senior corporate and private equity executives across Europe say in retrospect that more detailed IT due diligence could have prevented value erosion. In the same study EY states that “All of the strategic initiatives behind a transaction rely on IT. Businesses can no longer ignore IT or view it as a back-office function if they want to achieve maximum value.” (Source: Ernst & Young, IT as a driver of M&A success).

Also the IT market itself is changing rapidly. Many new players – large and small – enter this market and change the playing field. One of the results is a wave of acquisitions in the IT market often involving private equity firms. In this specific market Burnt Oak Partners also delivers value added services. “We provide industry insight to Private Equity and M&A advisors and help buyers with the selection of acquisition targets in specific segments of the IT industry. We possess an excellent network in this market, but are always interested to expand our connections.” says Peter Overakker.

About Burnt Oak Partners

Burnt Oak Partners is a boutique consulting firm delivering professional and independent advice in the areas of IT sourcing strategy, outsourcing contracts and IT related advice for M&A.

Burnt Oak Partners operates in the Benelux, Nordics and UK. The organisation works with partners and associates covering specific aspects. Burnt Oak Partners is active in various markets such as ICT, Manufacturing, Services and Finance.

Press contacts:

Burnt Oak Partners Benelux

Peter Overakker

Partner

+31 6 4676 8842

peter.overakker@burntoak-partners.com

Loth Content & Contacts

Theo Loth

+31 652 322 210

theo@loth.nl

The agreement further strengthens and clarifies the companies’ leading capabilities and value creation in strategic IT procurement and Sourcing Advisory.

Radar, the leading provider of fact-based insights for IT industry players, contribute with their benchmark models, supplier evaluations and their sourcing oriented advisors. Burnt Oak Partners, with operations in the Nordic countries, Great Britain and Benelux, contributes with its long experience and documented methodology in sourcing advisory. Overall, increasing and broadening the parties’ value creation abilities and strengthen implementation capacity in the respective local markets.

For Burnt Oak Partners, the cooperation agreement provides access to historical and real-time data from Radar’s price and quality models, supplier evaluations, and access to senior consulting expertise within Radar’s expert areas. The collaboration gives Burnt Oak Partners good prospects to further accelerate expansion as a sourcing advisor in their prioritized markets.

For Radar, the agreement allows for further focus in the consulting area for strategic IT procurement and sourcing advisory where the company has generated high value and efficiency creation in completed customer projects. In addition, Radar is given the opportunity to expand operations in the UK and in the Benelux region.

“As much as 70 percent of each IT penny is spent in the relationship between buyers and suppliers. This creates an increasing need for efficiency improvements in the area. Burnt Oak Partners gives us access to its proven methodology as well as strategically important new markets in the UK and the Benelux region. The combined experience and broad knowledge of sourcing as collaboration mean that we further increase our capacity and strengthen our ability to create customer values, “says Hans Werner, CEO of Radar

“Radar gives us access to key models and data within price, quality and supplier evaluation, historically and in real time. With this, together with the availability of Radar’s experienced advisors, we can generate additional capabilities and assume bigger and more strategic assignments within sourcing both in our local markets and internationally, “says Anders Svensson CEO Burnt Oak Partners

For more information please contact:

Anders Svensson, CEO of Burnt Oak Partners Nordic

anders.l.svensson@burntoak-partners.com

Phone +46 (0)733980110

Hans Werner, CEO Radar Ecosystem Specialists

hans.werner@radareco.se

Phone +46 (0)735391551