# Defenx PLC Q&A with Philipp Prince Chief Financial Officer (LON:DFX)

- Link: https://www.directorstalkinterviews.com/defenx-plc-qa-chief-financial-officer-philipp-prince-londfx/412722522
- Published: 2017-01-27T11:47:56+00:00
- Author: Amilia Stone

**Defenx PLC** (LON:DFX) Chief Financial Officer Philipp Prince caught up with DirectorsTalk
for an exclusive interview to discuss their latest trading update, Memopal, channel
partners, Café Bazaar and their goals for 2017

 

**Q1: Now, Defenx PLC have just published a trading update, Philip can you talk 
us through the highlights?**

**A1**: Yes, certainly. Firstly, we confirmed continued revenue growth which was
obviously our key target and that’s 57% organic growth driven by new products and
new channel partners that we’ve announced during 2016 and then 63% if you include
the 5-month contribution from Memopal. We also confirmed a further strengthening
in our operating margins as we’d anticipated in last years’ annual report so all
that to say the full year 2016 results are in line with management’s expectations
so we’re very pleased with that.

 

**Q2: Now you talk about bedding in Memopal, how has the integration process gone?
What’s the acquisition brought Defenx?**

**A2**: Memopal really brought us three key things:

– The first was some great cloud, sync and backup IP
 – Secondly, reference customers
like Turk Telecom (Turk Telekomunikasyon A.S. – IST:TTKOM) which gets us into a 
new market, Turkey, and Western Digital Corp (NASDAQ:WDC) – Third, it brought us
technical people

So far, we’ve really focussed on winning new customers, for example Memopal helped
us sign up Dylog Italia SpA (Gruppo Buffetti SpA), one of the channel partners we
announced last year, and the continue to introduce us to new parties. That’s been
the primary focus and drive for the last few months but at the same time our enlarged
team members are getting to know each other better and they continue to deliver 
great software. So, we really hope to be able to give more insight into Memopal,
how it’s going and what it’s contributing to the group in our 2016 results that 
we’ll publish in early April.

 

**Q3: You said when you IPO’d you’d be looking to broaden your channel partner network,
can you talk about how this has grown through 2016? Could you give us a little bit
more detail around the Café Bazaar agreement?**

**A3**: Channel partners, we had 4 or 5 large substantial channel partners at the
time of the IPO and went into 2016 with them and during 2016 we announced 8 new 
significant channel partners with real potential and we acquired 2 with Memopal.
So, the way we count it we say we have about 15 proper substantial channel partners
now as we go in 201. So, that virtually triples the number of partners we have but
it’s not really their numbers, it’s their scale and reach, many of these new channel
partners give us access to the SME smaller corporate market which is a significant
target growth area for us.

In terms of Café Bazaar, we think this is really exciting. Now that most of the 
Iranian sanctions have been lifted, our listing on this local android play store
really does show how our channel partner network delivers. We’ve got distribution
far quicker with a lower risk than trying to do it ourselves directly and it’s in
a high gross market, completely consistent with our strategy so we really think 
this is the beginning of something exciting in Iran.

 

**Q4: Finally Philipp, what are Defenx PLC’s goals for 2017?**

**A4**: Well I’d sum it up in three things, the first is to make some real progress
in the SME smaller corporate market, forthcoming product launches, mobile device
management and a new PC security suite to be launched this coming year will really
help drive us there. Number two, it’s growing revenues from cloud backup, the software
we acquired from Memopal, channel partners have consistently been very interested
in this and we now hope to see significant growth in 2017. Thirdly, we’ll continue
to expand the management team to bring in new skills and experience. So, the three
of those we think will really ensure that we can deliver another great year of strong
results in 2017.

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