New BGF backing for Evoke Creative following big contract wins
Growth capital investor, BGF, has made a multimillion-pound investment in Wirral-based Evoke Creative following significant contract wins and international growth.
Evoke delivers transformative digital solutions for retail and hospitality businesses by delivering engaging digital experiences with kiosks, signage and EPOS for clients such as McDonald’s, JD Sports, Bibliotheca and Google.
BGF invested £6m in Evoke in November 2018 and this latest investment will allow the firm to build on recent growth.
This year the business has driven significant international growth securing contracts with two US multinational restaurant brands representing nearly 70,000 restaurants across the globe. The rapid roll-outs to such brands allows Evoke’s customers to benefit from significant revenue boost and cost-savings.
Evoke has also signed a three-year contract with an international hotel brand worth £5.6m, demonstrating the business’s ability to deliver end-to-end specialist solutions blending kiosk hardware, customer-facing software and enterprise integration, with sector-leading service levels.
Evoke CEO, Peter Edwards, said: “We’ve had a standout year and are on course to deliver a 35% uplift in sales for our current financial year with huge potential for future growth.
“The investment will allow us to continue to invest in our technology and increase kiosk outputs to meet demand.”
Evoke’s co-founder, Neil Clark is taking this opportunity to step away from his role but remains a shareholder and fellow co-founder Dean Ward will continue in his role as CPO.
Neil Clark said: “I’m leaving the business in the very capable hands of CEO Peter Edwards and a very strong management team.
“It’s been an amazing journey since Dean and I started the business 15 years ago and I’ve met some wonderful clients and suppliers on the way, so I’ll be sad to leave everyone. Evoke has an exciting future ahead, and I wish everyone, particularly Dean, all the best for the next phase of growth.”
Ian Plumb has also been named non-executive chair at Evoke. This appointment was supported by BGF’s Talent Network – one of the largest groups of board-level non-executives in the UK and Ireland.
BGF investor, Rhys Davenport, said: “Evoke has secured a series of impressive customer contracts this year in terms of value, scale and the calibre of brands they are supporting. We look forward to working with the team as they continue to build on this in the next chapter.”
Advisers were: BGF – DWF (Will Munday, Matthew Judge, Alexander Szehidewicz, David Hill); Evoke – Brabners (Daniel Hayhurst, Nathan Samuel and Brendan McAleese).
