Appirio expands application footprint with FinancialForce PSA
- Summary:
- Wipro-owned cloud integrator Appirio launches FinancialForce PSA practice to expand its global reach in professional services automation
The Appirio practice is starting off with a team of 25 but could grow as large as 60-strong by the end of the year as it expands internationally, says Braden Larmon, VP of global services at Appirio, who spoke to us earlier this week. Most of the current 25 are based in north America, with support from India, and a couple in the UK. Expansion would see that grow to fifteen in EMEA and five to ten in Australia and New Zealand. This ties into Appirio's global expansion as Wipro continues investment in the subsidiary, along with growing opportunities and some contracts already signed for FinancialForce PSA outside of the US, says Larmon:
As they look at their growth trajectory and as we further consolidate our position in continental Europe and south-east Asia, that is very attractive to both parties.
The core PSA team will also draw on resources from Appirio's existing Salesforce practice, as the FinancialForce software is built on the Salesforce platform and so draws on the same skills in important areas such as integration, analytics and user administration. But Appirio will also work on FinancialForce projects where the client is working with a different professional services firm for its Salesforce instance. That ability to take on projects alongside larger consultants such as Accenture or Deloitte without conflict was one reason why FinancialForce has chosen to partner with Appirio, says Larmon:
We were still in that range of a boutique-ish consulting firm and a lot of bigger firms wouldn't see us as a competitor. We've already seen a couple of those [projects] going on right now in our pipeline.
Shared history on FinancialForce PSA
Another factor was the shared history the two companies have on the PSA product, which was originally developed in-house at Appirio before being sold to FinancialForce in 2011. Appirio remains a user of the product for its own PSA needs, and the two companies have remained "friendly partners," says Larmon. It is FinancialForce's need to support its ongoing growth that has led to them now formalizing the go-to-market and delivery partnership, he explains:
FinancialForce were also at a point where they had enough traction and were having an issue where they were running into capacity issues.
The history made Appirio a more natural choice than some of the others.
The focus on PSA means that Appirio is less likely to be implementing the financials elements of FinancialForce in the projects it works on. Larmon tells me:
For us it is about focusing on the core capabilities around PSA.
A lot of times people are interested in looking at those other products, but the drivers are PSA. Where we can bring in billing and accounting systems and start to build that out, that will vary depending on the markets we go after.
Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS)
One area where clients do look at billing and financials is in smaller professional services groups that from part of a larger organization, he adds. Often, those are engagements where FinancialForce's broader messaging around blending products and services in an Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS) model comes into play. These are opportunities for Appirio to become more of an advisor to the business rather than simply an implementation partner, says Larmon.
We fully intend on helping organizations make that transfer from a time-and-materials mindset, to focus on outcomes not hours. For example in medical devices, or tech companies, it's not just about selling a bunch of servers, it's about selling the services that go around those. We have to help people go through that transition.
FinancialForce is where we see a great lever to help them with automation of process so they can focus on that.
Appirio developing relationships
The addition of FinancialForce PSA marks the first new partnership Appirio has announced since its acquisition by Wipro in late 2016. Its flagship practices are in Salesforce and Workday, along with Google and AWS. Others may follow, says Larmon, particularly in the Salesforce ecosystem.
We do have relationships with a number of others that we do continue to ramp — more around the quote-to-cash space.
Appirio's former CEO Chris Barbin took on a new role at Wipro last month as Global Culture Officer, leaving Erik Duffield in charge as Global Business Head of Appirio Cloud Services. Duffield reports, as Barbin did previously, to Hiral Chandrana, Senior Vice President at Wipro and Global Head of Business Application Services.
Barbin has not talked publicly about his role since announcing the move in a blog post in February, but he and Chandrana had previously spoken about underestimating the time it would take to integrate the two companies' cultures in sales and other areas.
My take
This announcement hardly comes as a surprise, but the timing is interesting. It's the first public announcement from Appirio since Barbin stepped down as CEO, and suggests that its trajectory continues along the lines set down during his leadership. Meanwhile it comes a month ahead of FinancialForce's annual customer event, when the vendor will want to deliver a strong message about its traction and direction. Having the world's third-largest Salesforce consulting firm formally confirmed as an implementation partner can't do any harm in that regard.
Appirio's plans to expand the global footprint of its FinancialForce team also suggests that the PSA product is growing well, and will add global heft that would be a stretch for FinancialForce to provide on its own resources.