This month, November 2013, SynApps Solutions celebrates a decade of providing powerful content management solutions which transform the way our customers work. This exciting milestone provides a good opportunity to reflect on how far we’ve come and the landmark developments that have got us here.
Jim Whitelaw, MD of SynApps Solutions
One of the keys to our success is that our business never stands still. Our strategy is one of continuous innovation because we understand that, to have maximum impact for our clients, our solutions and services need to be relevant and fit-for-purpose, addressing customers’ current and emerging business challenges.
But where did it all begin?
Our vision: to set content free!
SynApps, an enterprise content management (ECM) specialist, was the brainchild of Jim Whitelaw (Managing Director) and Richard Wiffin (Technical Director), formerly members of the north European professional services senior management team at Documentum.
In the spring of 2003, Jim and Richard found themselves grounded at Heathrow by a delayed flight. It was while passing the time, in the company of their two friends Johnny Walker and Jack Daniels, that the seeds of SynApps were sown. Over a series of dinners with soon-to-be co-founders Jason Scholes, Paul Edwards, James Paton and Neil Johnson at the Spaghetti House in London’s Victoria, the parameters of the new company began to take shape. SynApps began trading on November 10th.
Richard Wiffin, Technical Director, SynApps Solutions
Drawing on the founders’ project delivery skills, the business began by focusing on ECM consultancy and implementation services, targeted at large, blue-chip organisations. Customers spanned the UK, Benelux and beyond – indeed, one of our very first assignments was to design and implement a loans processing system for a major bank based in Sydney.
Drawing on our links with Documentum, we became the company’s first premier partner in Europe. Today this relationship comes under EMC’s C3P partner programme, following EMC’s acquisition of Documentum.
SynApps Solutions today
Today, in addition to strategy development and consulting services, this includes the resale and implementation of market-leading ECM software as well as hosting and support services.
Our expanded strategy has helped accelerate our growth, creating an organisation which today has a headcount of around 40.
Along the way we have developed our offerings and formed some strong partnerships to become an acknowledged leader in the ECM market. In addition to being EMC’s longest-standing premier partner in Europe, we are now an Alfresco Gold Partner. We also have long-established partnerships with major systems integrators including CapGemini, CGI, CSC, Qinetiq and ComputaCenter, which we support with specialist ECM solutions and services.
Looking ahead
We are very proud of what SynApps has achieved in the last 10 years and look forward to continued growth and success over the decade ahead. We wouldn’t be where we are today if it wasn’t for our creative and immensely hardworking people, or our ambitious customers and the visions they are striving to fulfil, so we want to extend our heartfelt thanks to all those who have shared in our journey to date.
SynApps Solutions timeline – key milestones
- 2003: SynApps founded as an ECM services specialist
- 2004: Mark Winstone joins as Sales & Marketing Director. ECM portfolio expands to include specialist software and hosting services as well as consultancy and implementation
- 2006: Development and release of ConXLoader, a bulk content migration tool
- 2009: Development and release of ConXSys, an integration framework to connect content from line-of-business applications to an enterprise content management (ECM) platform
- 2010: SynApps becomes an Alfresco Gold Partner
- 2011: Development and release of ConXMail and ConXOffice, allowing content from Microsoft email and office systems to be incorporated in ECM
- 2011: SynApps wins EMC IIG Partner Innovation Award for the ConXApps suite of ECM solutions
- 2012: Major new venture underway, working with EMC and J4Care to design and deliver healthcare-specific content management solutions, particularly in the area of vendor-neutral archives (VNAs). SynApps Solutions is now an established leader in this field and help Trusts migrate towards more open content-sharing environments especially where medical image records are involved
- 2012 – 2013: SynApps develops and launches a comprehensive set of SaaS offerings through the government G-Cloud, in the areas of case management, document and records management, and content capture
- 2013: A new dedicated, high-security support office is opened in Hemel Hempstead