Financial technology firm Beeks Financial Cloud, which is based on the outskirts of Glasgow, has continued its expansion drive with an acquisition in spite of the uncertain outlook for markets.
Beeks has agreed to buy Velocimetrics for up to £4.55 million, in a deal that will allow the company
to expand its produce range and customer base.
Aim-listed Beek supplies technology that can be used to speed up online trading in financial products.
London-based Velocimetrics has developed software that can be used to monitor transactions that are in progress and for the production of performance analysis.
Beeks had planned to develop the capability to offer these in house.
However, its chief executive Gordon McArthur said: “ The acquisition of Velocimetrics accelerates our product roadmap, providing us with the ability to offer our clients network monitoring and trade analytics, increasing our competitive differentiation while minimising anticipated product development spend for this functionality.”
He noted Beeks expects to be able to sell its existing services to Velocimetrics’ customers.
Mr McArthur had underlined Beeks Financial’s growth amibitions last month when the company posted a near 50 per cent increase in interim underlying profits, to £0.6 million from £0.41m.
The company’s customer base includes large financial institutions and private investors. These have had to deal with considerable market volatility amid the global fallout from the spread of the coronavirus.
However, in an update on trading issued yesterday, Mr McArthur said: “The increased volatility across global financial markets is providing a positive trading environment for a large proportion of our customers.”
He said the company had seen minimal detrimental impact on trading in the quarter to March 31, with the majority of customer implementations continuing as scheduled.
Velocimetrics achieved £1.16m revenues in the year to June 30. It lost £0.47m before tax in the year. Beeks noted the potential to reduce costs and to achieve synergies.
Beeks grew first-half revenues by 23% annually, to £4.3m, from £3.5m.