In the faddish IT industry, new technologies often fail to live up to early hype and struggle to find a “killer” use case.
But for every blockchain or metaverse, other technologies — including artificial intelligence, cloud computing and workflow automation — break through to the mainstream and capture a share of corporate IT budgets.
These three business technologies feature prominently among the IT and software services companies which account for a fifth of this year’s FT 1000 ranking of European businesses by revenue growth.
Using AI to detect theft or fraud is a growing market for tech start-ups. In recent years, retailers have been hit by a wave of store thefts, sometimes involving violence.
Paris-based start-up Veesion aims to help business owners fight back using AI-powered surveillance software that analyses closed-circuit TV to catch shoplifters. The software combines machine-learning algorithms with biometric technology to spot suspicious body movements, such as a customer putting an item in their coat or opening products.
The technology, used by more than 4,000 stores in over 25 countries, cuts shoplifting by up to 60 per cent on average, according to Veesion, which was founded in 2018 by three former data science students.
“Our system is continuously learning [and] getting better”, says Hamza Saleem, Veesion’s senior account executive for the UK and US. “We have . . . a lot of data in terms of behaviour analysis of how a shoplifter [acts] on average and the different kinds of movements that AI can pick up on.”
Veesion, 52nd in the FT1000, claims its biometric technology is better at identifying shoplifters than facial-recognition-based software. The latter can recognise a thief only if they have been spotted before and their face is in the system, says Saleem.
With the spike in shoplifting showing no sign of abating, demand for retail surveillance software looks set to remain strong. In 2023, Veesion’s revenue was about €6mn, up from about €200,000 in 2020.
Future products may also help Veesion’s customers spot employee theft, Saleem adds.
“A lot of our customers are asking about [technology to help them detect] shoplifting from their own staff, for example behind the checkout where staff are putting . . . cash into their pockets,” Saleem says.
Ranked 18th in the FT list, SourceWhale also incorporates AI in its subscription-based workflow automation software, to boost efficiency at recruitment companies.
Its cloud-based software connects dozens of IT systems and automates agencies’ daily tasks, such as following up with candidates, business development and collating data from platforms including LinkedIn, as well as email and back-office IT systems.
While there is no shortage of software for recruitment agencies to plan and implement tasks, joining the dots between systems can be tricky.
“One of the biggest issues for recruiters is admin,” says co-founder and chief executive Timothy Hogwood.
SourceWhale was founded as a recruitment agency in London at the start of 2020 by two friends who met at university. Initially, its technology was built as a sideline — a way to automate recruitment tasks and increase profit margins.
But when recruitment work dried up because of the Covid pandemic, the tech offered a lifeline. SourceWhale had begun to partner with other agencies, some of which were impressed by its technology.
“A couple of [recruitment agencies] said, ‘Tim, you’re an alright recruiter, which, as you know, is British for relatively crap . . . but why can’t we just use your technology — we’ll pay you for it’. So, we . . . got dragged kicking and screaming into being a [business to business] software company.”
After winning its first software customer in the summer of 2020, SourceWhale grew fast, without external investment from venture capital firms. In 2023, it reported revenue of €7.75mn, up from €137,000 in 2020. Its biggest market is the UK, then the US.
The software is used by thousands of agencies, including Robert Half. “By focusing on our niche really, really well, it’s allowed us to grow incredibly fast . . . because we know our customers better than anyone else”, says Hogwood.
One such client, Primis — a technology-focused recruitment company — estimates that SourceWhale software has produced a return on investment of between 12 and 18 times the cost of the technology by helping it win new clients and place them in jobs. Primis founder, Ben Broughton describes the software as “massively time saving and cost cutting”.
As with Veesion, theft detection is part of the sales pitch for Solidstudio, a Polish start-up which makes technology for electric vehicles. Ranked 73rd in the FT 1000 list, the company makes software for operators of electric-vehicle charging networks and drivers.
“The software helps EV drivers find chargers, pay for the charging, start charging [and] manage the charging session,” says CEO and co-founder Paweł Małkowiak.
But developing AI technology to detect fraud involving electric vehicles is a priority. An example is when RFID (radio frequency identification) cards — which drivers plug into charging stations — are cloned. If this happens, a driver can charge different EVs in multiple locations — which has become “quite common” says Małkowiak.
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