Iomart, the Glasgow-headquartered cloud computing group, has supported a technology transformation for the National Lottery Community Fund, enabling hundreds of staff to deliver vital financial support during the pandemic.
The fund is one of the non-departmental public bodies responsible for distributing lottery funding to good causes and is the largest funder of communities in the UK.
Iomart’s consultancy team has spent the past three years working with the fund’s director of technology and data, Matthew Green, on a key project to redefine its technology and infrastructure.
The value of the overhaul became acutely apparent as the Covid-19 crisis began. By the time the first nationwide lockdown was announced last March, the fund’s 850 employees were already working from home.
Staff were able to collaborate online, sending and receiving in excess of four million emails and holding almost 1,000 calls and meetings every day.
Green, who led the project, said: “The fund has distributed over £500 million of National Lottery and funding from government since lockdown began in March 2020, which would have been incredibly challenging to do with our old systems. Thanks to the partnership with Iomart, we have enabled our colleagues to get vital funds to the communities that need them.”
Nick Martin, director of consulting for Iomart, added: “Our expertise in optimising the user experience as well as introducing new technologies enables us to help organisations like the National Lottery Community Fund to improve their effectiveness.”
In December, Iomart said it was seeing business confidence begin to return after reporting a “resilient” first-half performance.
Chief executive Reece Donovan, who recently took the reins from long-serving boss Angus MacSween, said new business discussions had gathered momentum in recent weeks pointing to improved confidence in longer-term IT and digital transformation projects.
The latest results showed revenues nudging up 2 per cent, year-on-year, to £56.3m in the six months to the end of September. The firm benefited from strong levels of recurring revenues, accounting for 90 per cent of the total, up from 87 per cent previously.
Profit before tax was down 29 per cent at £6m, though adjusted underlying earnings held up at £20.8m, a fall of just 4 per cent.
Source: The Scotsman