£500k investment will create 40 jobs at technology specialist

NPIF-Maven Equity Finance has invested £500,000 in Altrincham-based INTEC Business Solutions, which aims to revolutionise specialist support services for small firms.

The funding will fuel Intec’s recruitment drive to strengthen the team, creating more than 40 jobs and help the company to develop and grow its network.

NPIF-Maven is part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund, managed by Maven Capital Partners (“Maven”), one of the UK’s most active SME investors.

Founded in 2016, Intec is a recent entrant to the business technology sector, building a network of mobile partners and providing specialist support services and solutions to their customers.

It works with SMEs and business leaders to help them identify and design technology business models offering a fully-scalable solution with technology that can grow with the business.

An ‘end-to-end’ independent technology consultancy, Intec, assists with the design, implementation and support of a range of cloud services and business applications, including IT managed services, IT infrastructure support, hosted collaboration and communication solutions.

Inec says, with the number of social media users estimated to grow to 3 billion by 2021, it is now a necessity for businesses and brands to be online.

It says it can deliver technology that keeps up with the evolving tech landscape, and help companies deploy solutions to compete more effectively.

Intec’s management team all have significant experience in start-up and scaling and selling in channel development, cloud IT and telecoms businesses operating in this space.

Chairman and managing director, Simon Howitt, has held a number of senior roles in growing and established businesses, previously working for Yes Telecom, Vodafone and Outsourcery.

He developed the Intec model with chief technical officer Ray Bell and the pair were initial founders of the business.

In the early stages of the business they were joined by finance director Simon Newton, who qualified as a chartered accountant with KPMG and has worked in the corporate finance departments of a number of investment banks including Hambros Bank, Barclays de Zoete Wedd, Credit Suisse, First Boston and ING.

Maven was appointed manager of the £57.5m equity fund in February 2017, part of the £400m Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund, a partnership between the British Business Bank, 10 Local Enterprise Partnerships in the North of England, the European Investment Bank and the European Regional Development Fund.

NPIF-Maven Equity Finance is now supporting the growth aspirations of high-potential SMEs across Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Liverpool, Cumbria and Cheshire.

Dave Furlong, investment director at Maven, said: “Intec has developed a truly unique business model.

The company’s route to market clearly differentiates the business from other consultancies in the tech sector and makes it such a compelling proposition for us as investors.

“This is a great example of a young, but high potential business using NPIF funding to scale its business, and we look forward to working with the highly-experienced and entrepreneurial Intec team to help them execute their ambitious plans for the business.”

Simon Howitt added: “We are delighted to have NPIF as an equity partner.

“We are excited about what we can grow and achieve and from the first meetings with Maven they fully understood our model and plan and have shown similar excitement.

“We have taken a concept, turned it into a plan and started to execute the plan. With Maven’s support, we are confident we can drive the plan faster and be even more ambitious.”

Grant Peggie, director at British Business Bank, said: “Tech firms account for a significant proportion of applications coming into NPIF, so it’s good to see businesses like Intec benefitting from the investment. This deal demonstrates that funding is available to support innovative scalable companies.”

The Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund project is supported financially by the European Union using funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth Programme 2014-2020 and the European Investment Bank.