Published: Jan 29, 2020
Focus:
NPIF Maven Equity Finance
Technology start-up Broadstone, has extended its funding by a further £1.5 million in order to service major contract wins in recent months, scale operations, and to accelerate the development of its product roadmap and staffing marketplace. This takes the total raised by Broadstone to £2.5 million to date.
The latest investment was made by NPIF Maven Equity Finance, along with a number of angel investors – most notably Peter Searle, the former UK CEO of temporary staffing agency Adecco. In just under two years since launch, Broadstone’s platform has gained 30,000+ users in the UK looking for shift-based work in regulated sectors. Fulfilment also jumped to 83% in Q3 2019 – the industry benchmark sitting at just below 45%.
The Manchester-based company’s ‘Labour-as-a-Service’ platform, draws on data, automation and gamification to connect large corporate organisatons, to those individuals looking for temporary work.
The platform currently focuses on regulated industries and allows organisations to access a pool of qualified and compliance tested talent – saving companies the time, money and effort of engaging traditional temporary staffing agencies. Job seekers benefit by being able to go through one simple vetting process and gain access to work directly from their phones for multiple companies. In addition, they can also see how much they’ve earnt from a shift and have the ability to drawdown their earnings quickly and seamlessly.
In recent months, the company has won contracts with major global organisations G4S, ISS World and OCS – this meaning it now has five of the top 10 security companies in the UK as clients, with a combined annual turnover of $2.27bn and market share of 55%. Broadstone plans to extend its operations into the Facilities Management and cleaning sectors in 2020.
Co-founder & CEO Tom Pickersgill said: "Labour-as-a-Service is growing fast in recognition as a term, and as the market leader in regulated industries we are well-placed to strengthen our position. We've recently seen Uber moving into this market with Uber Works, demonstrating the model’s strategic importance. In fact, The Economist predicts that by 2029 all workers will be listed on at least one labour platform – this presenting Broadstone with a huge market opportunity.
“The investment has come at a crucial time in our evolution as it will allow us to accelerate the creation of a new product roadmap and roll out a number of new capabilities for our expanding customer base of global players. Winning contracts with organisations like G4S and OCS, gives us a real opportunity to expand our operations into multiple sectors and geographies, whilst giving us the scale to fundamentally redefine the way people search for work, get paid and prove they qualify for roles. Longer-term we have ambitious plans to establish our model in key markets – the US being one we want to move into by 2021."
The Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund project is supported financially by the European Union using funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth Programme 2014-2020 and the European Investment Bank.
