NASDAQ goal for high-flying tech firm AppSense

NORTH West technology company AppSense, which has seen sales rise 65% in the last year, is planning to list on NASDAQ in the next two to three years.

The privately-owned company headquartered in Daresbury, Warrington, has just won a major contract with the Department of Work and Pensions, worth around £5m over the next six years.

Appsense, will provide desktop management solutions to the DWP for more than 1,000 locations in the UK.  The six year contract involves approximately 140,000 desktop devices.

AppSense, owned by technology entrepreneur Charles Sharland, already works with a host of major corporates including JP Morgan Chase, United Airlines, Wachovia, Wal-Mart and broadcaster ESPN.

In its most recently-published accounts, for the year to last July, turnover rose 12% to £18.2m.

The ambitious company saw revenues leap 65% this year. It is growing fast in the US – where it has offices in New York and California.

Peter Rawlinson, pictured, vice president, marketing told TheBusinessDesk the strategic plan for AppSense is to seek a listing on the US NASDAQ market in “two to two-and-a-half years.”

He said: “We are a successful business with good resources and a healthy financial position. We see it as a strength that there is no external shareholding, and there are no plans for this to change. The likely outcome is to become publicly traded on NASDAQ.

“We see a massive opportunity for growth in user virtualisation technology. We have a leading position in the market.”

AppSense is a pioneer of user viirtualisation software which has a number of benefits for companies running a large number of desktop computers.

Using its software the organisation can control desktop facilities, migration and application delivery from one centralised host computer.

Users’ log-on times are speeded up as the system remembers their personalised settings, which are no longer set to one PC or laptop.

Commenting on the partnership with Fujitsu for the DWP contract he said: “Our goal at AppSense is to provide a flawless, personal, predictable and easily manageable user environment.

“We welcome this partnership with Fujitsu as we provide the DWP with an improved desktop environment that will result in cost savings and increased productivity.”

Manchester lawyer Tom Bridgford, partner and technology specialist at Hammonds and commercial lawyer Hayley Rouse, advised AppSense on the partnership.

Mr Bridgford said, “AppSense’s user virtualisation solutions have a proven track record so we are confident that they’ll be in a strong position to produce a high quality experience for the end user.”

“Due to the sheer scale of the project it has been a complex deal which has included many months of negotiation.”