The development team at Vision Critical has been busy over the last few months completing 13 brand new OSMO^® extractors suitable for instant release.  The team are now working on a further 9 OSMO^®s that will be released to the general portfolio shortly, with plenty more to follow.

To find out more please submit an outline request form, found on our Contact Us page.

Vision Critical’s most recent member of staff this month is Michelle Rideout.  She joins in the newly appointed role of Systems Tester.  Angela Otton, Senior Project Manager comments: “Michelle brings with her a wealth of development and user acceptance testing skills and experience.  She is a very welcome addition and is already proving to be a valuable asset to our already exceptional System Test team.”

Vision Critical has further strengthened its development team with the new arrival of Daniel Harvey this month. As a Technical Analyst, Daniel’s primary function is to expand the growing portfolio of OSMO^® extraction software for a combination of UK, US and European accounts packages. In addition, he provides technical support for OSMO^® installations.

Charlotte Chadwick, Managing Director comments: “I am delighted that Daniel has chosen to join the team. I have no doubt that his excellent technical skills will further strengthen the development of our product offering and continue the enhancement of our market-leading OSMO^® service.”

Development has now been completed across 150 separate accounting packages available in the UK. Varying versions of Sage, the largest accounts package provider, equate to approximately 44% of implementations and 56% comprises of other mainstream accounts packages.

A special mention should go out to the development team – who constantly update and improve the ever growing OMSO^® library keeping Vision Critical at the forefront of financial technology innovation.

Vision Critical has appointed John Thornton as a Non-Executive Director. John was previously CEO of the largest national mid-market insurance broker in the UK, AON Group.

He comes to Vision Critical with a proven track record of delivering bottom-line results as a commercially focussed, strategic business planner, with an outstanding record of operational leadership, business development and change management. The appointment will further strengthen the Vision Critical Board as the company enters an exciting new phase of its development.

John joined Aon in November 2002 from the Royal Bank of Scotland Group where he had been Managing Director of Corporate and Commercial Banking for the UK and Chairman of the Banks’ factoring and invoice discounting company. The majority of his career has been spent in Corporate Banking with various organisations in London, New York and Chicago. John spent 7 years working in the US, initially as Head of Strategy and Marketing, leading the expansions of the Banks’ US business and subsequently as SVP Mid-West Operations and later EVP for the North American Corporate Banking Operation. While in Chicago, John attended the Advanced Management Development Programme at the Kellogg School. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Bankers and a sought after speaker at various Risk Management conferences. John graduated with a MA in History from Cambridge University in 1980.

Oliver Chadwick, CEO, comments: “John’s wide experience and track record, especially in new markets, will enable him to greatly contribute to the Board’s strategic planning and we look forward to working closely with him. John is here to assist Vision Critical in maximising brand and shareholder value, as well as utilising his substantial experience to guide the business through strategic channels and opportunities.”

As you are aware, RED NOSE DAY 2009 has come and gone. From the moment the iconic London Eye turned red, the entire nation went mad. This year, to be a part of the shenanigans all you needed was to DO SOMETHING FUNNY FOR MONEY!

Vision Critical were not alone in joining the nation with all the tomfoolery going on around the country. Firstly James Beeches, Customer Service Manager, nobly painted his entire, Yes his ENTIRE head to look like a red nose! Ryan Gregor, Customer Service Executive, and John Crawford, Technical Analyst, both painted their faces to match the theme. Well done all three for getting through the day with complete composure & dignity!

As a bit of extra fun we hid “red noses” around the office for people to hunt them out throughout the day! Written inside were questions about our business, office & staff. This hunt had the additional incentive of a nice sweat treat for those lucky enough to get the questions correct!

All this funny business united the nation in trying to make a difference. To give thousands of people who face discrimination, injustice or grinding poverty the chance to transform their lives. In our office in Farnham we managed to raise enough to feed a hot, nutritious lunch to over 3,000 children living in extreme poverty in Zambia. Thank you all at Vision Critical for giving so generously.

Close Invoice Finance has won a coveted Computing Award for Excellence 2008 from Computing magazine for IDeal , its unique online invoice discounting system.

Peter Merry of Close Invoice Finance was quick to praise the efforts of Vision Critical, who’s OSMO^® software powers the effortless transfer of customer financial data into the lender’s IDeal system. “We are proud to win this prestigious award for Best Small Business IT Strategy. We couldn’t have achieved this without Vision Critical’s customer financial data extractor software as our starting point. OSMO^® has proved to be a critical building block that underpins the entire IDeal system. The quality and accuracy of the data extraction and transfer process, the reliability of the software in use and the coverage of accounting software packages have simply shone through for us. The flexibility that Vision Critical has shown in the creation of bespoke OSMO^®s to meet accounts package variations and customer needs has been vital to our success in the adoption of the system. Our work is not over and we will continue to enhance IDeal for the benefit of our clients. Vision Critical has a very supportive team whose contribution to the project has been immeasurable not just during the early stages of development but also on an ongoing basis.”

Computing comments: “The paperless office has been a pipe dream for years, but Close Invoice Finance’s strategy to cut the paper chase from the invoicing process has brought it one step closer. The company’s invoice discounting facility eliminated 1.6 million sheets of paper in its first year.”

The IDeal system has also won the Global Business Excellence (GBE) Award for Outstanding Technology Solutions. The Awards aim to recognise and reward business excellence across all sectors for working smarter than competitors to create a business edge.

Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical says: “We are delighted to have played our part in powering the automated and effortless transfer of customer financial data with our unique OSMO^® solution. What Close Invoice Finance has achieved using OSMO^® as a platform is nothing short of remarkable in terms of service innovation, enhancing the customer experience as well as improving risk management. Our many congratulations go to everyone at Close Invoice Finance for being recognised for the achievement of excellence in these and other major awards. We look forward to setting new standards, new benchmarks and attaining new horizons in business technology.”

Vision Critical is delighted to announce that it has been granted a Community Trade Mark (CTM) for OSMO^®. A Community Trade Mark (CTM) is any trademark, which has been registered in the European Union as a whole (rather than on a national level within the EU). While other intellectual property rights have a limited duration, registered trade marks, such as OSMO^® can last indefinitely.

Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical, comments: “This recognition of our exclusive rights to use our product brand, OSMO^®, which has become synonymous with the effortless extraction and transfer of financial data, is a step forward to the development of a recognised world-class brand. We see our trade mark as a valuable asset, vital not only to protecting our intellectual property but also to attracting investment and licensing opportunities.”

“As a registered trade mark, we can from this point forward use the ® symbol rather the TM which we have been using to date. We are in the process of creating brand guidelines to protect and maintain the importance, value and integrity of OSMO^® to our business, our clients, partners and the wider business community,” explains Mr. Chadwick.

In these unprecedented and uncertain times, where to some extent lenders and their customers face the unknown, there is a real need for clarity.

Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical explains: “One of the greatest challenges that lenders face today, that has been well documented by the media of late, is the need for transparency of risk exposure in real-time. This is particularly true of the invoice discounting market, where mid-month visibility is vital. Through the receipt of daily information, client managers gain the advantage of being able to make the right funding decisions at the right time.”

This is where Vision Critical, the customer financial data extraction specialist, has come to the fore by providing the ability to:

• Install its OSMO^® software to extract receivables and payables data from a borrowers accounting package without visiting them for subsequent onward extraction and population of current Risk Management Screens or systems such as Risk Factor;
• Take a 12 month history report of all transactions within just 20 minutes via the telephone and over the Internet to provide a clear position;
• Calculate daily disapprovals by category and individual debtor, along with their ageing to enable month-end risk management to be automated on a daily basis;
• Release transparent receivables data immediately to third-party risk management specialists, corporate restructuring and outsourced credit management companies;
• Match data with Status Agencies or Credit Insurance companies to establish a clear view of credit worthiness and insured availability globally.

“For some time, Vision Critical has been widely regarded as playing a vital role in helping lenders gain greater transactional efficiency. More recently, it has transformed the way in which banks use technology to lend with greater certainty”, Oliver Chadwick concludes.

Vision Critical has announced the recruitment of two additional members of staff to its growing employee base, George Sharara and Ella Burrows.

A Technical Analyst, George’s primary function is to expand the growing portfolio of OSMO^® extraction software for a combination of UK, US and European accounts packages. In addition, he provides technical support for OSMO^® installations. Ella has joined Vision Critical this month as a Customer Support Executive. This role involves client contact and subsequent installation of OSMO^® software, liaising between lenders and their customers in support of the market-leading financial data extraction software and web based application.

“Adding the experience and enthusiasm of these two new members of the team strengthens our ability to provide best-of-breed solutions and services to our clients”, said Mat Heritage, Operations Director for Vision Critical. “Our lineup is now more solid than ever, at every level of the business. We are developing and unleashing new market strategies that will keep our company well positioned as business information industry leaders, as we continue to grow in line with the scale of the opportunity that OSMO^® has created.”

Vision Critical has appointed Charlie Ramsay to the newly created position of marketing executive. Charlie recently graduated from University College for the Creative Arts, with BA (hons) in advertising & brand management, specialising in strategic planning. Reporting to Oliver Chadwick, Chief Executive of Vision Critical, Charlie’s responsibilities include the development of marketing and business plans, brand guidelines, presentations, the analysis of new markets, together with direct and channel communications.

Charlie comments: “This is a fantastic opportunity to work within a progressive, rapidly evolving company and in an exciting and diverse range of markets. My first day has involved meeting with our agency, Strand Financial, on an exciting new advertising campaign for next year, plus a high level group discussion on the future for Financial Widget technology. I look forward to working with the team to drive the business forward.”

Oliver Chadwick adds: “We are delighted to welcome Charlie to Vision Critical at a very exciting time in our development as a company as we move to the next level as a thought-leader in the global business information market. As a business, we now embrace Asset Based Lending, Supply Chain and e-Invoicing, through to Digital Services spaces. Charlie’s role will be pivotal to the inception of balanced marketing and branding programmes in leading organisational and market change.”

Deployed to over 2,000 corporates in the UK and Ireland, OSMO^® was initially developed by Vision Critical to satisfy the demands of the £173bn UK asset based lending industry. This solves the significant problems associated with the automated real-time transfer and collection of invoice and payment data, previously stored in borrowers’ accounting packages. To achieve the effortless transparency needed to automate these and other services, Vision Critical has created a software library covering 85%+ of UK and Irish corporate accounting packages, both current and legacy, together with a growing US and European library.

Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical, sets out the company’s ambitious geographical expansion programme: “The Vision Critical management team is pleased to announce a clear integration target for OSMO^® in Europe, namely compatibility with a minimum of 60 per cent of accounts packages within the next six months. Target countries include Poland, France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Turkey, Spain, Portugal, Russia and Italy. I predict that Vision Critical’s know-how and ground-breaking technology will result in a significant transformation among European lenders adopting the service, in a way that is already enjoyed by the UK market. Now this is being extended to embrace additional European countries, the scalable benefits of OSMO^® are heightened both for large multi-jurisdictional players and those looking to accelerate their development and gain first-mover advantage by the adoption of OSMO^® in their domestic markets.”

Vision Critical’s most recent member of staff this month is Rosie Ellis, a highly qualified gap year student in IT and Mathematics. Following induction and comprehensive product training, Rosie will join Vision Critical’s talented development team to assist with system testing and supporting the development of European Accounts packages.

Charlotte Chadwick, managing director of Vision Critical says: “The recruitment and retention of highly motivated and talented young people is essential to a fast-moving technology business such as Vision Critical. Having a blend of youth and experience is vital to our success. It makes for a balanced team and provides an inspiring and collegiate atmosphere, in which we work together closely to resolve issues rapidly and create new opportunities for our clients.”

“At Vision Critical, we recognise the benefit to our clients and the motivational impact on our people of high levels of training and development. This is clear through the number of talented people we develop and retain within the organisation. We have not yet had a member of the team leave us since we started trading 4 years ago and I feel that we provide a healthy developing environment for our team members to work in. It also offers our clients excellent levels of continuity when communicating with us.”

In our key note presentation at the International Factors Group Annual Conference in Bangkok, Thailand, we gave the world-class audience a glimpse of the latest Web 2.0 Technologies. Entitled “Breaking the productivity barrier: Driving sales and savings with breakthrough receivables technology”, we focused on the significant impact that innovation will have on the asset based lending industry. The IFG conference is the only truly international event for the leaders in asset based lending to come together to discuss the industry’s unprecedented growth as well as trends and opportunities.

“Vision Critical is the perfect example of how technological innovation has the potential to transform this trillion dollar global industry,” said Erik Timmermans, Secretary General of the IFG. “With more than one hundred of the world’s asset based financing leaders on hand to discuss the exciting future of the industry, we look forward to continuing the insightful and energetic discussions on the tremendous opportunities technology and innovation will provide to grow the industry.”

Oliver Chadwick comments: “We are privileged to address such a respected and receptive audience. IFG plays a pivotal role in the global development of the asset based lending industry and we are delighted to work with the Group and its membership to accelerate business critical change through technological innovation.”

Vision Critical has further strengthened its development team with four new appointments this month. Jason Alonso, Ryan Rolfe, James Landucci and Teresa Morrish are focusing on the creation of bespoke OSMO^®s, in addition to the development and refinement of new software suites in order to meet growing client demand. The recruitment drive comes as a direct result of the widespread adoption of OSMO^® by the ABL market in the UK and internationally. Eight new staff have been appointed since the beginning of the year and this represents an exciting time for the company.

Charlotte Chadwick, managing director of Vision Critical comments: “I am delighted with each of these appointments. I have no doubt that with their technical skills, experience and background, our new team members will make a strong contribution to the continued expansion of Vision Critical’s business. This investment in people will fast track the development of our services and I am really looking forward to working with this talented team to drive our offering even further.”

The Business Money Annual Review 2007 has been published and Vision Critical features throughout the magazine for its transformational role in terms of dramatically increasing the funds in use and secondly the client/office ratio being achieved with the use of OSMO^®. Sometimes it’s best just to step aside and let others do the talking. This is one of those times. Business Money Editor, Bob Lefroy writes: “A fabulous report from the aforementioned David Thomson regarding not only Close, but also embracing the wider marketplace: could put me out of a job! David summarises the challenger from fraud, SMEs seeking frequent changes of financier, margin competition. Nevertheless, a focus on service and seeking business at practical rates to justify it has served Close very well.

It was a master stroke being first to the party with the revolutionary IDeal discounting product, one that makes use of Vision Critical’s real time reconciliation systems. It allows greater exposure levels with much lower administration costs making the product a ferocious competitor in term of flexibility, cost and service. The figures reflect this. Factoring business is down overall but just look at the discounting numbers with sales and advances up 31% and client numbers up 25%. Average loan size is up 5%, operational efficiency measured by the client/officer ratio has improved 50% since 2002.”

Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical, comments: “This has always been our vision and highlights the transformation of the asset based lending market in the UK through its widespread adoption of OSMO^® technology. That these statistics have now been confirmed by leading players in the industry within its major trade magazine review underlines just how far we’ve come.”

Vision Critical, a pioneering global business information partner to financial institutions and corporate clients, is relocating to new premises at Bridge House, South Street, Farnham, Surrey. The company previously occupied part of 6/7 West Street, Farnham, and is relocating to the 3,641 sq ft prestigious riverside suite to accommodate business expansion plans.

“Leading financial institutions in the UK, Europe and the US have selected Vision Critical as a trusted partner in the effortless and transparent transfer of customer financial data. As a result, our business has now grown to the point that more space is necessary to house all of our OSMO^® development and support teams,” said Oliver Chadwick, CEO of Vision Critical.

He adds: “When we started in our original offices, we always knew that we would have to relocate at some stage. We didn’t realise that the move would come so soon, but we are thrilled to have outgrown our original space so quickly as it highlights how significantly the business has expanded. Relocating to Bridge House is a real milestone for Vision Critical and gives us the additional facilities we need.

OSMO^® installation rate hits 98%

The growth of the OSMO^® product and its acceptance within the market has enabled Vision Critical to publish some truly impressive figures against Key Performance Indicators – implementing 98.87% of installations received from their current client base of lenders within the UK. This has been achieved by Vision Critical’s collaborative approach of working closely with lenders to ensure that the message to their clients is positioned correctly.

Development reaches 80% of packages

Development has now been completed across 80% of the accounting package universe in the UK. Varying versions of Sage, the largest accounts package provider, equate to approximately 40% of implementations. 40% comprises other mainstream accounts packages and the remaining 20% are bespoke trade-specific systems that have to be developed uniquely for each borrower.

March 18th to 20th, 2008 Essen (Germany)

Recognising that there were no dedicated training courses available for Risk Management in the Receivables Finance Industry, the International Factors Group decided to organize its first Risk Management Seminar where participants can share experiences, learn from their international colleagues and gain new insights in an informal environment. This seminar was very much a practical, hands-on approach to the management of risks faced every day by the asset financing industry.Following a speech by Vision Critical on client risk management in the two factor environment, Oliver Chadwick commented:”IFG has been a tremendous success for us and I really want to give them full credit for the valuable support that they and their members have shown us since we joined at the annual conference in Rio last year.”

“The members collaborate seamlessly, pooling their global and local industry knowledge in the interests of each client. The knowledge, quality and reach of the IFG membership aligns perfectly with our thinking and culture at Vision Critical. As such, IFG forms a significant and integral part of our ambitious plans for international growth.”

Vision Critical has taken to the speaker’s platform once again, this time working with Paul Davidson Taylor, one of the South East’s leading law firms. Our speech at the PDT Winter Workshop was very well received and, judging by the host of questions afterwards, created a positive environment for discussion. The subject was “Transparent technologies to proactively reduce risk and automate predetermined monitoring controls.” Oliver Chadwick comments, “OSMO^® is now playing a key role in making companies aware of potential fraud by providing access to real time data with effortless transparency. Having visibility of the dynamics of the ledgers and the ability to drill down quickly to anomalies is proving pivotal in identifying and beating incidences of fraudulent behaviour in these credit crunch times.”

FT Adviser featured Vision Critical this month in a full article explaining how the company is looking to expand its data transparency service across Europe and the US. The piece comments that OSMO^® has been adopted by 16 asset-based lenders in the UK, France, Germany, Holland and Belgium and that the technology is being developed for lenders in the US, which represents a significant opportunity. Ian Byers, corporate development director for Lloyds TSB Commercial Finance, made the following comment in respect of OSMO^®: “Where there is manual intervention, there is risk. To be able to strip that out, is a benefit. The service reduces clerical work, because not having to re-key every invoice, there is less work for our clients. We would hope to have 80 per cent of our clients with this system at the end of the year. The faster it is, the faster we can react to our client. The faster information flow in our business and reliability of the data and this is crystal. Now it is an integral part of our business.”