‘Our goal is to become a £20m company, and acquisitions in AI will help’: Vissensa CEO
Steve Groom sits down with CRN to talk developing AI for mid-size businesses, acquisition offers, and global footprint
Born in 2008 in Minstead, a small parish in Hampshire, Vissensa is now a vast MSP with activity not only across the UK, but also the rest of Europe, South Africa, Asia, the US, and Australia.
The village, which counts one shop, one pub, and one church, now attracts the attention of tech players from all around the world, as the firm receives three to four acquisition offers a week, Steve Groom, the company’s founder and CEO, tells CRN.
But Groom has no interest in selling, as “the service quality and culture usually degrade after acquisitions, even when brands aren’t changed.”
He explains the business is currently valued at £6m market capitalisation and is aiming for £8.5m next year and £20m in five years.
This runs on a multiple the MSP attracted of four-time recurring revenue with a low client attrition rate.
It also retains 97 per cent of customers and expects £8.5m in revenue this year.
To generate this growth, the MSP describes itself as vendor agnostic and partners with the likes of HP, Microsoft, Cisco, Dell, Fortinet, and CrowdStrike.
“We just exited the Broadcom/VMware model, building our own alternative stack,” explains Groom.
It also partners with distributors such as TD SYNNEX, Westcoast, and CDW.
Customer base
The firm started in the datacentre business in 2008.
“We managed kit, rented it, or provided a shared cloud environment
“When cloud 2.0 emerged, people began seeing the value of hybrid models.
“They understood the economics of cloud, where it works and where it doesn’t.
“Now you see movement both to and from cloud, with edge computing playing a big role.”
He explains that while the AI phase has created a gold rush which puts the focus on data, how to extract IP, and gain a competitive edge, Vissensa has helped both small and large organisations navigate this, including £15bn market cap banks in the US (Washington DC), Europe (Dublin), and Asia (Singapore).
“We even support some in Australia, as they need real teams on the ground for highly secure, low-latency connectivity, and then use AWS and Terraform at the front end.
“Some are already experimenting with LLMs and Anthropic.”
While this allowed the company to be successful internationally, Groom realised no one knew his company ten miles outside its offices, which led him to focus locally.
“We built out managed services and high-SLA support for even tiny businesses like two-person start-ups.
“We approach every business with the same mindset: security and reliability are important, regardless of size.
“We’ve been doing this for large organisations since 2008, and we’ve just applied it downward to smaller clients.”
Groom describes his customer base as broad.
It currently serves 130 customers, around 115 of which are in the UK.
Through its partnership with Equinix, the MSP set up in LD4, the vendor’s datacentre in Slough, which the CEO describes as “a premium finance location, particularly for North American traffic routing into London.”
This gave the organisation traction with small finance firms, traders, bitcoin companies, and more.
“From there, we expanded to large enterprises,” he adds.
Vissensa is also involved in the energy sector.
Groom mentions, without naming it, one of his customers which was a three-person solar PV distributor that’s turned global, and for which the MSP has built IT infrastructure in warehouses across the UK, South Africa, and Europe.
“We also serve transport and shipping companies, logistics businesses, property firms; it’s a wide range,” he tells CRN.
“Our focus is on providing both IT support and strategic infrastructure.
“We also have some defence customers.
“One of our datacentres is in a List X site in Farnborough, which is helpful for that sector.”
A List X site is a commercial facility on the UK territory that is approved to hold and process classified government information.
The firm is also involved in charity, “not just offering discounts, but also fundraising and participating in physical events like bike rides and swims.”
To support its customers, Vissensa employs 19 people, mostly technical, with low admin overhead.
“We have five open positions now, and likely more coming,” he highlights.
“We may hit 30 people by 2030; there are no plans to scale massively.
“We use partners globally and work remotely when needed.”
80 per cent of the company’s revenue currently comes from the UK.
Acquisitions and entering new markets
Rather than focusing on acquisitions, the CEO explains the business has entered new markets via anchor customers.
“Once we had one, we built up from there, slow but steady, very deliberate growth.”
It has also reportedly grown value by around 30 per cent year-on-year.
Groom explains rather than downsizing during COVID, the company invested heavily in marketing.
On the other hand, when it comes to technology capabilities, the company does have room for buyouts.
“Our goal is to become a £20m company, and acquisitions, particularly in AI, will help.”
Even though the MSP has not yet made any buyouts and has no external investors, Groom claims it is “cash-rich and stable.”
AI focus
Amid its wide array of customers, Vissensa intends to develop AI strategies for mid-size businesses.
“Many are in ‘listening mode’; they don’t understand the difference between small and large language models or how to protect their IP while leveraging AI,” highlights Groom.
“Most organisations’ data isn’t AI-ready, it’s scattered, insecure, and disorganised.”
To help structure and secure it, the firm strives to introduce AI in “a private, high-security environment,” which it often does within Equinix.
“We pitched Equinix on compartmentalised shared racks to lower the entry barrier for AI infrastructure.
“They’d never considered it, but they said yes.
“We’ve also split our business: cloud and MSP, which is the same team, but focused on different ICPs and markets.”