Launching in the midst of the pandemic, Sydney-based professional services company and Salesforce partner J4RVIS grew from two co-founders to approximately 80 staff in just three years, crediting their growth to strong background credentials and selective hiring.
CRN Australia spoke to J4RVIS’s two chief executives and founders, Pascal Uerlings and Jannis Bott, in late 2022, to discuss how the company shot to success in such a short time period.
Previously, they worked together at other system integrator companies.
However, in April 2020 they founded J4RVIS, recognising a need for customer-oriented system integrators.
Uerlings said that he and Bott built a strong partnership whereby his entrepreneurial background and Bott’s technical skills made the ideal combination to launch a successful business.
J4RVIS' revenue tripled from $2.25 million to $6.8 million between the 2021 and 2022 financial years respectively.
Bott attributes this significant growth to being “well connected in certain industries from years and years of consulting by knowing both people in the Salesforce and MuleSoft ecosystem, especially from the go to market sides.”
“I was able to come in and act as a trusted advisor that then started to open doors, and eventually created the opportunity for us to hire our first employee. I think that was back in May 2020.”
Bott explained that his attainment of the credential Certified Technical Architect in Salesforce assisted in their fast growth, as it increased his credibility and showcased his expertise.
“That credential has helped open doors left, right and centre because you're very unique and your market value is pretty high.”
Launching during COVID-19 provided an opportunity for J4RVIS to establish and capitalise on long term partnerships, which enabled their growth over the past two years.
By providing proof of concept, J4RVIS said it was able to establish trust and value with clients.
“Now we’re part of the IT strategy, the IT roadmaps, for the next three, five years."
"I think that really helped us accelerate the growth and capitalise on the difficult year, which was the first year of our existence,” Uerlings said.
“I think we've also created a stronger reputation in the market, which has allowed us to open doors to other clients that have helped us to grow.”
Bott said J4RVIS’ key differentiator is that it strategically hires people who have had a background in a particular industry, to ensure expertise and knowledge when communicating with clients.
“We want to be able to talk your language the moment when we enter the room,” Bott said. Industry knowledge helps “the customer immediately build trust in a very different way because you understand how the business process works.”
J4RVIS currently has 80 staff across Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and the Philippines.
Throughout 2022, Bott said J4RVIS interviewed approximately 400 people and hired 40.
“We want to make sure that people who join our organisation will be ready to be in front of a customer and can consult a customer."
"I think by being that selective, your quality immediately increases.”
“Our first or second employee was in the Philippines. The strategy was, from day one, that we have an offshore delivery centre based in the Philippines,” Bott said.
“It was always part of the strategy to have a delivery model where, on one hand side, customers here in Australia, get the consulting, the advisory, the project management, the change management that they expect,” Bott said, “versus the cost benefits you get by bringing in an offshore team.”
Staying up to date with upcoming trends and regulations gives J4RVIS opportunities to reach out to companies with a “a solution ready to go to address or differentiate” them from other similar companies in the same space.
A major milestone for the company was signing its first customer, which had a statement of work greater than seven figures.
“We see that organisations are willing to invest more money with us but also trust us to deliver larger programs of work and that's certainly a status that you need to earn that doesn't come overnight."
"That's a huge milestone for us to see.”
Bott said that a focus of the 2021 to 2022 financial year was “doubling down on industries, and structuring our business to align with these industries.”
“We had a big shift in structuring our organisation into more dedicated practices that look at capabilities like Salesforce MuleSoft delivery.”
J4RVIS had shifted its revenue mix, with managed services a rapidly growing segment.
The company targets mid-size business, but also smaller organisations that can’t afford a full-time administrator, or organisations that have a very broad product mix that they leverage from Salesforce.
The company’s managed services also allow customers to access a wide range of different product areas that span capabilities across marketing, CRM integration and more, under one fixed fee.
During the 2021 to 2022 financial year, Uerlings said J4RVIS “invested in a lot of the UI/ UX for customers and before we start building, we provide this concept and see how we can bring that solution to life.”
Bott said that the rapid growth of J4RVIS was challenging, particularly after reaching 50 employees.
“I think we realised quite quickly that we needed to pivot and automate processes,” Bott said, “or to approve certain things that just don't need us by giving control away.”
Looking ahead, J4RVIS has expansion plans to strengthen their footprint in existing locations, as well as determine the next logical market and different product offerings.
“We're not looking at building something completely separate, but it's perhaps opening another practice that caters for some of the areas that we have not prioritised quite as much in the past.”
Uerlings shared that J4RVIS had launched internal initiatives to discuss, and build proof of concepts around AI.
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