Fintel in Huddersfield hails strong performance as revenue rises to £31.7m

The Huddersfield-based firm, which has around 500 staff, saw revenue grow 10 per cent from £28.9m to £31.7m. Adjusted pre-tax profit was up 12 per cent from £5.4m to £6m.

Matt Timmins, joint CEO of Fintel, told The Yorkshire Post that he was delighted with the first half results and that the business delivered a “really strong financial performance” as it ticked off some “key strategic deliverables”.

Fintel consolidated Defaqto, which provides software, financial information and product research to product providers and intermediaries, into the business. The firm also said its rebrand from The SimplyBiz Group to Fintel was “really positive”.

David Thompson, chief financial officer at Fintel, says the financial strength of the business has been a highlight.

He said: “These are a really strong, robust set of trading results, which for me highlights the resilient nature of the business model and the recurring nature of its revenues and that flowing through to cash.

“The fact that we’re able to pay down debt really quickly as a business is also a really important tenet of our sustainability, longevity and our heritage.”

Mr Timmins added: “What we’re looking to do is continue our solid financial performance and more importantly than anything for our business is the development of our fintech client base and big enterprise partnerships.

“We provide services to individual advisory businesses so that could be a small advisory firm of one or two people or it can be an advisory firm of 15 or 20 people. That’s been our history and heritage.

“Through the acquisition of Defaqto, what this great technology platform allows us to do is provide enterprise scale solutions.”

The joint CEO of Fintel says the firm has proven its ability to deliver enterprise scale solutions through its partnership with Tatton Asset Management.

“As we look forward, what you will see is our business provide more of these enterprise solutions to larger businesses,” Mr Timmins says. “That will be a clear path to growth for our company.”

Fintel also disposed of employee benefits platform Zest Technology for £10m, which the firm says was a non-core asset.

Mr Timmins said: “We are committed to retail financial services. We’re committed to working with intermediaries, independent financial advisers, wealth managers, consolidators, mortgage brokers and product manufacturers. That’s where the focus of our business is.

“Employee benefits, while a great market and Zest Technology is a great company, it didn’t fit into the core operating model.

“It was consuming management time. It was consuming cash and investment within the business. We really wanted to focus on the core and find the right home for that business. You could say we didn’t feel we were the right owner.”

The business says it has significant financial resources to match its ambitions, both in terms of accelerating organic growth and creating value through acquisitions.

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