Latest / Breaking the ICE / Episode 5 - Andrew Passfield and the Story Behind the ICE-Tech Merger

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Episode 5 - Andrew Passfield and the Story Behind the ICE-Tech Merger · Breaking the ICE

• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome back to the Breaking the Ice Podcast.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: This is episode five of season one.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: I am your host, Elliot Dragon, and I'm going to be joined in a few minutes by uh a very uh esteemed guest.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um but before we get there, I'm gonna go off script a little bit and just do a bit of a news roundup, some headlines I found interesting from the past week or so.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um so one thing I was reading recently was that uh Alphabet, the company that was formerly known as Google, um, just posted quite impressive financial results um from a revenue standpoint, uh 80% plus year-on-year growth for their cloud service.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um but for the first time in the company history, so over 20 years of company financials, they have negative net cash flow and uh due entirely, almost entirely to the big AI infrastructure spend that they've had.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_01: And uh investors didn't like it.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um stock was down 5% after they announced the results.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I think you know that signals two things.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: First, obviously there's a heavy infrastructure race that's happening.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: We're seeing big time spend from uh all of the major players.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, but I think moreover, it was the investor sentiment that was particularly interesting.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um I, you know, I think we're gonna start to see uh, well, I mean, we've seen it in the SaaS space already, but there is going to be investor pressure for returns.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, to see, to see the results from such a big company like Alphabet were interesting.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, second uh second item I want to bring up here is uh a little bit closer to home for uh us in the enterprise software space and and maybe the one or two people that are listening to this uh that may also be in the enterprise software space.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_01: Uh OpenAI just released their own uh video chat service called Presence.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: And uh it's something that they were they had deployed and were using internally for internal support tickets, um, but they're now making it open source and open to the market.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it signals that OpenAI, as a sort of you know, the starting uh player here is gonna drift more into the enterprise software space, where they had previously started with foundation models, with building out infrastructure.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: Um like I said, with the alphabet piece, I mean, there's gonna be investor pressure here for returns.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so it just becomes a logical extension for them to start to deploy their own proprietary tools in addition to, you know, uh creating a marketplace for third parties.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: So um a shift in competitive landscapes in the enterprise software space.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then the last one, uh, we should all uh start to see this come more regularly to us, but Google has just released the selfie video for authentication purposes.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: Apple took a big step in releasing Face ID uh to authenticate.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Google is taking it a step further.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: I guess fake ID is has been hacked by the uh the uh negative cybersecurity network.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: And uh so video is now becoming the next, I guess, step along that chain.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh people who are using the selfie video uh functionality to authenticate themselves.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: They will uh be required to do different motions or movements with their head, uh, maybe you know, blink twice or something like that in order to avoid deep fakes and other sort of you know AI spoofing.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so we should all see this come become much more of the paradigm going forward.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it does just put an emphasis on the need to keep cybersecurity in mind, right?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, as much as we're all excited to test out and try a lot of these tools, um, there are bad actors out there, right?
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we need to be conscious of how we protect ourselves.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_01: So um, yeah, I just wanted to start at this episode a little bit differently with a little bit of a news roundup.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: And without further ado, I would like to bring in our guest for this week's episode, uh, none other than Andrew Passfield.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_01: Andrew was the co-founder of Ice Insure Tech, who recently merged with Nordic Insurance Software and uh has created the uh newly formed ETC Ice Tech.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: So, Andrew, welcome to the Breaking the Ice podcast.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's great to have you on board.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, how are you doing today?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Good thanks, Elliot.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um nice to be on board.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um slightly sweltering day in the UK, so uh useful being in the office with air conditioning.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: That's okay.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we're gonna record a seven-hour episode so you can stay nice and cool.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: Perfect.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: No worries there.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: No worries there.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: Andrew, I know when we uh agreed to start doing this podcast, you had written into the contract that you had to be the first guest.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: Uh unfortunately, we didn't get you on immediately, but I hope it's okay that we got you on as our third ever guest.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: Of course.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: And um John will just give a little background to me.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, please.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I've been around uh the insurance industry for too long, some sort of 40 years.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um starting back in the mid-80s when direct insurance definitely became a bit of an explosion in the in the UK.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I had a I had a dream at school to um to go into the insurance industry for who knows what reason, um, and found my way in.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but very interesting in a sort of very dynamic US-owned uh direct insurer before some of the likes of of Direct Line um and others came along in the UK.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh worked there for a number of years before moving into uh the software side of the business, um, working for um various suppliers, both on the claims and the sort of consultancy policy side, and then yeah, founded ICE, as you know, back in back end of 2002, beginning of 2003.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I I mean let's zoom in a little bit on that phase.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, what prompted you to start ICE?
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh uh you know, was it uh was it a a gap in the market that you identified from supporting the market from insurance standpoint?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think we'd seen um we'd seen a number of large sort of software businesses, a lot of them were sort of mainframe or or or maybe sort of Unix-based um applications for those that can remember those days.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And we felt there was an opportunity to come in with a sort of less of a monolithic design, and and I stood for the insurance component environment.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: So this idea that we could build very modular um systems, sort of plug them together, we had no legacy.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um we we were very much in the era of browsers, albeit less powerful browsers in those days, but you know, the the the sort of competitors had come from a a sort of mainframe or or perhaps a fairly clunky um sort of client-server experience.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the key was really to um to have a fresh start, focus on claims initially, um, and then more laterally moved into policy.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Policy was definitely a more more crowded market and and and claims less so.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: So we we focused our efforts on looking for some building some some base products and and looking for some uh sort of charter clients in the claims space, and then over time that evolved into into policy.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: Coincidental that that was the same sort of path that Nordic took, right?
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Nordic started as a claims platform uh and then eventually onboarded the policy side as well.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um just a random question, but could you ever have imagined when when you started the business in 2003 what the technology landscape would have been 20, 25 years down the road?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: I I mean, obviously we all sit here and prognosticate a little bit, right?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: We think about what what the future of tech is going to hold.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: But I I mean, could you ever imagine?
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's it would have seemed like sci-fi, I would imagine.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, I mean, I think as I mentioned, you know, we we didn't have that sort of legacy of of client server, and I think we made some pretty smart technology choices in in in the early days.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly as a as a Java based solution, I think that was that was that was quite wise.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um a lot of the a lot of fads have come and gone in the in the sort of Microsoft world.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um in the Java world, there were things called enterprise um uh Java beans, uh, again, a technology that that died fairly quickly.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: We never really had any major rewrites.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: We we we picked some some smart technologies.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think as we've gone along, we've continued continued to invest in those sort of technologies and and keeping them up to date and moving libraries on, uh moving, you know, following the sort of cloud native initiative.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: We were we've been a cloud native platform since 2017.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I think it's been relatively incremental, but but sort of you always have to keep your eye on on reinvesting in your software, otherwise uh it's just going to become legacy very quickly.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think the whole AI explosion is definitely a different dynamic these days, and and that I would say, yeah, that's that's definitely more in the sci-fi um camp as you described it.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I think the sort of the base platforms and we've continued to evolve.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um it'll be interesting to see how the next couple of years go as as I guess the AI hype becomes more reality or or doesn't become reality.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm convinced it will be.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: But um yeah, we know there's a lot of hype out in the market uh around AI at the moment.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, absolutely.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: And we'll and we'll get to AI in a second.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but but just backing up a little bit, uh you know, starting in 0203, there was a you know a decade plus pre-acquisition.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: What were some of the highlights of that period as a founder?
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, some of the big milestones.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um I mean, uh uh founding a business and and and sort of building a software business, I can assure you there's as many uh lowlights as there are highlights.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, we had a couple of customers going into administration.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I was actually uh driving up one of our motorways, the M6, I think, uh, and I had the the news channel on and uh one of our a pretty major PLC uh announced administration at seven o'clock and and so was breaking news at 7.15.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um that nearly sent me off the uh off the side of the motorway.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I think in terms of of sort of highlights, as you win customers, that's the the big achievement.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, you try and get this these products out to market, you see them sort of being accepted by customers by signing out, by by uh sort of guaranteeing your sort of revenues and cash flow for the next X number of years while you continue to invest is a definite highlight.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um but also I would say, you know, just on a on a sort of personal basis, um we've we've got people that have worked for us uh uh since those early days in 2002, 2003.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: I've seen some of those sort of long-standing employees get married, I've seen some of those long-standing employees have kids.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's always quite nice from uh just from a sort of personal perspective.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: But I think the you know the real highs are as you as you win more customers, uh, you build out more capability, you get more general sort of acceptance, you get into different sort of RFIs and RFP processes.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I I think we've been on a on a pretty steady journey up the sort of curve to the point we are now where where I think certainly in the UK market, we are one of the three leading players and always competing against much bigger sort of US private equity-backed businesses.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think I I mean you you'll probably uh relate to this or even agree with it, but I know from from the Nordic platform standpoint, one thing that I always found was particularly rewarding was the fact that we built this sort of uh mutually beneficial, symbiotic relationship with the market, where every time we won new business, it was a bit of an affirmation of our thesis, of the platform we were building and the way we were designing it.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: And vice versa, you know, we learn so much every time we get somebody new on board, a different way of doing something, a different way of looking at something.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and so we, you know, we can give back out to the market, you know, uh, this continuously positive loop of functions and features and case studies and uh and and and you know, be narrow enough and deep enough that it's quite relevant for that market.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and I'm sure, you know, you you experienced the same uh over the past 20 years.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we you know, if I think back to some of the early customers, we started in in the sort of motor claims world and working with sort of third-party administrators uh back in sort of 2000 and and and four was our first customer.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: We built what we thought was a was a generic engine to cover all lines of business.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um first couple of implementations were remoter, so they were relatively straightforward.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: Then we won a household uh implementation and we found all the things that we thought were were nice and generic weren't.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: So you go back and do a kind of bit of a re-engineering exercise there.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: But but again, it's sort of we got there and and that validated that it was feasible across different uh lines of business.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember in 2008 we got our first insurer, so we'd gone from sort of someone that was servicing insurance companies to to an actual insurer, and there's a different level of functionality around and then the claims market around sort of payments and reserves and and recoveries, which perhaps third parties are uh are less interested in.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: So so again, you build more capability, you build more functionality, um, but you sort of see that level of acceptance as you start moving up that that sort of uh food chain, as it were.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Definitely.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: So the particular particular highlights I remember, um, that that sort of move into into home and then into our first uh first insurer.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, we've got two insurers almost at the same time.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: So so that made made life a bit easier and and gave us sort of two perspectives rather than one.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: And and that obviously leads up to now being acquired by Acturus, joining the Acturist group.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um any anything particularly notable about that process?
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, I think um well we we got acquired originally in in 2012.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: We'd got to to a size where I think we'd grown a pretty mature product, and um we'd invested a lot uh invested everything back into the product to build IP.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: And one of our challenges is we started to get into discussions with larger insurers, and and you may well have come across this with with the Nordic guys.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I sort of coined a phrase that said we were we were sort of loved by the business because we're a very configurable platform by the business.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: We were sort of tolerated by IT because we were using standard technologies and and and capabilities, and we were kind of hated by procurement because we had a a terrible balance sheet, we were pumping every penny back in.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh client-based are risk managers, they're insurers, so they're risk managers, uh, and and we're often seen as a big risk.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, we we first got acquired in uh in 2012 um by uh by a listed plc, um, which went very well for a for a couple of years, then we had a a couple more challenging years as uh as that plc ran into its own difficulties.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then we got the business sort of put up for sale, and um I'd known the actress guys quite a while.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, Theo and David were the two founders, and and we'd been in sort of discussions where we could use our claims platform with their their broking platform uh or some of our MI capability.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: They also had a guy working there called Jim Luremer, who had been a customer of ICE.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um so he was the CIO at um uh Heath Lambert, uh, which was acquired by by Gallagher.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: So so Jim was a customer, and then he'd sort of asked me my opinion on him going to Actress, and and we'd sort of compared notes on that.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: So when the opportunity for for uh ICE to be acquired came up, I reached out to to Jim.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and I would say, you know, we had a lot of interest in the business, but actress were the most consistent and the most thorough in in that process.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: We had a lot of people that sort of say, oh yeah, you know, we're really interested, tell a great story, not hear from them again.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Actress put us through the mill in terms of doing the sort of configuration, testing us in a in a sort of commercial insurance environment, which is one they knew.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I think we build a lot of mutual respect for each other during that process, whereas, you know, some smallish private equity companies come in and and and are sort of just chancelling it really, I think, um, and didn't bode well for a sort of long-term relationship.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm very happy where where we ended up.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, everything that the guys told me in terms of of letting us run the business and and get on with the business, they weren't going to be be overpowering, um, has absolutely come true almost to the point.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: And and again, be interested in your view on on how the Nordic guys found it.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: But um I was almost sort of dumbfounded by the by the lack of sort of not so much control, but the lack of sort of group processes in group uh purchasing power.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: I think we we had a group FD and uh and they insisted we use their accounting system and and that was it.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: That's all we got.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't, you know, we didn't even have purchasing power on on sort of laptops and things like that.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: So um, yeah, that's that was certainly my experience.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what you guys saw in in this.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think uh, you know, uh very similar.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I I always have chalked it up to uh just the fact that they were they were separate businesses.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I think the one group function that I probably used more than anybody and and sort of took advantage of was the group legal, uh, because that's been a saving grace, honestly.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um to not have to either in-source or outsource legal has been uh great for our bottom line and and great for my sanity.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so I, you know, I I think I think that they were they were conscious of of you know not wanting to disrupt the chemistry and the strategy of each of the independent businesses, but to start to drip feed some synergies, you know, where where it made sense.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: We're all fairly geographically distributed, you know, and our customer bases are geographically distributed.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: And and um uh, you know, I I think up until recently, you know, which is where you and I became uh colleagues, um, you know, there hasn't been too much of a justification for more of the formal, formal sort of, you know, um merger activity.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there's risk in that, you know, I think there's there's big cultural risk.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're acquiring you're acquiring startups, and a lot of times the founders are still involved in the business, right?
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_01: So uh I think culture was really important to their ethos in building the group.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um I do oftentimes uh kind of wish that we got a bit more uh time and attention and and and you know, at a group level, they're extremely busy, right?
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and maybe I should be careful what I wish for.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, you know, they're they're clever guys and and you just uh oftentimes I find myself coming out of meetings with them and going, oh gosh, you know, I'd I'd love to just tap into uh your brain and and get more and more uh feedback.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: But uh um yeah, maybe I should be careful what I wish for.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think we've um yeah, I mean, I I think it's you're right, it's about getting a balance, but we've always been, you know, the the thing for us in the UK market is actress has a huge reputation.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the founders have a huge reputation.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: They have the founders are are very well connected.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: So so where I needed some.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Some contacts that I didn't have, then we were able to leverage that and that respect, particularly where we'd come from a sort of slightly, slightly troubled parent.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: And let's leave it there.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's a great segue into uh the news that we announced uh in January that I mean the work started on it well before then, uh, but obviously we announced the merger of of NIS and Ice Insure Tech to create the newly formed Ice Tech.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um aside from getting to work with me every day, which I'm sure has been the biggest highlight for you.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what I mean, what how would you describe how things have gone over the past six, seven months here?
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think um the the let's talk about the logic first.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: So I think you know, within the Actress Group, there's a number of uh businesses that were very focused in the in the sort of broker market, whereas uh NIS and ICE were very focused on the insurer and MJ market.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um although we focus on different areas with with ICE perhaps being stronger in the UK and in the sort of volume personal lines of of home and motor, having never done anything in the sort of travel or more sort of IPMI space, and and the logic with uh with NIS guys being much more global and uh having done many implementations uh outside of their core territory um and ICE wanting to achieve that.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was a it was a logical coming together.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: Hopefully we can get some synergies and some savings for the growth, but really it was about the sort of opportunity.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: We didn't do the typical sort of merger and and take 10% of the cost base out.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was about learning from each other and trying to make a a sort of uh a bigger entity.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, I think we've you know we're we're getting familiar with with working with different colleagues in different territories.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, we were very much UK-based and and now I'm talking to you regularly, and and and you're over in Toronto.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of the NIS guys are in um Copenhagen, uh, and we regularly trip out to Copenhagen as you and I did uh two or three weeks ago.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um we have a team in London.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we also have two both had a team in Poland, so we've bought those together.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and ISIS has always had a team in um in Malaysia as well.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I think we've we've worked our way through it.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: I think um you can look back and think, well, I might have done some of these things differently, but I think the way we've we've gone about it and what we've achieved uh to date has been pretty good.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um we've built a very sort of stable base, we've invested, I think, together much faster in AI than we would have done individually, perhaps.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and yeah, I would say, you know, onwards from here.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I think uh it's it's it's too early, I think, to to sort of you know look back and and correct things, if you will.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm still quite excited at the prospect of tapping into a lot of the ice services that that you'd built out over the past 20 years.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: So tapping into the digital services, which is something that we always had to, you know, work with their parties on.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: Uh obviously the the sort of mutual AI build that becomes the the bridge between the two platforms, which for the record are still operating independently uh and and will continue to do so.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: But having that um that AI uh infrastructure orchestration layer that can bind the two together into one complete package is is extremely exciting.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that product uh and and platform uh you know strategy leads itself into then the next phase, which is for you and I to you know execute the the cross-selling, right?
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: So um being able to present that picture to the market um in in all the different places that you know we have joint uh you know joint exposure in.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think I think that's really exciting.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: I think we're still a little ways out from that, but um I think the next you know three to five years are are are going to be very, very exciting, you know, and and different from the last 10 for me, certainly.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I would agree.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, we're already seeing benefits of of leaning into each other.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_00: Where you know, you and I are uh are collaborating on a number of sales opportunities.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um you've mentioned things like digital and and ai, uh, but we use some of the the NIS guys experience to help us deliver PET at um at Aviva and Garrett Line.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then we have a similar opportunity with with travel in that same uh same customer.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: So um yeah, I think uh I think it is uh it is exciting.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: So I mean we touched on AI a little bit, uh, and I you know you said something that I think has has echoed similar sentiments that I've had, which is uh there's a lot of hype around it, but what it eventually becomes remains to be seen.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: Uh what are your thoughts?
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um I mean, I think for us, you know, there's a couple of angles.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: One, we're focused on what we can bring to our product and functionality for our customers.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but the second is where we can gain efficiencies in internally.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think from an internal perspective, we've had some really good successes.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um particularly in the areas of uh of sort of coding and and sort of technical debts and and some of the pieces that we've done there.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think we've probably been less aggressive in in other areas and and and they're starting to play catch up.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I guess that's a bit of a learning point from us uh or for us.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I think from a product perspective, you know, we've we've got in with some capability from both an agentic and and an orchestration perspective.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um already delivering those solutions to to two key customers and you know looking for for sort of case studies and references out of that.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: I I sat in on a on an all-day workshop with a prospect in the um in the pet space a few weeks ago where we demoed quite a lot of AI working within specifically that pet market where we're we're pretty focused at the moment.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I remember their feedback was you know, a lot of a lot of your competitors going through this process with us have talked about AI from from a set of slides.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: We've actually demoed AI capability, and I think that's what people are wanting to see is is let's bring it to life and and and show it working, but let's not, you know, the the the sort of first customer we're implementing our orchestration engine with.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: We're just looking at some fairly low-hanging fruit in terms of sort of process automation and sort of taking humans out of the loop um wherever possible.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I do, I do think that sort of you know, pick off bite-sized pieces rather than just try and bore the ocean in one go is the is the right approach.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, let's see how that develops.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: I will take this opportunity to make a plea on behalf of both of us to the market that somebody has to be the first or second or third mover here.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: So I mean, take a chance.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we know what we're doing.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um because we you know, we've we've we've been living through this uncertainty cycle as well, Andrew.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_01: And and it's been it's been challenging.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and and we we drive the platform forward.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, I mean, uh my my limited exposure to things, you know, behind the scenes has been remarkable change in how the product is developed and tested and deployed.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, thinking back five, six years ago to what we're doing today, the pace of change, the surety that we can get by having so many more digital eyes on code uh is remarkable.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um but there still is this air of uncertainty that's that's enveloped the industry.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not just, I mean, I think it's it's pretty well documented now in the press that um, you know, a lot of enterprise software firms are fighting against this from uh from a buying cycle.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um any any thoughts there other than just you know, misery loves companies, so feel free to bring it on.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I think um, you know, we're definitely seeing that in the marketplace.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_00: There are, I guess, you know, um people that are thinking that AI might offer a silver bullet to legacy transformation.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_00: I personally don't think it does.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, can it regenerate some code from I don't know, something like Power Builder into C Shuff?
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure it can do a pretty good job.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, has that changed the underlying architecture?
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_00: Has that given you the agility to to launch products to market?
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it can certainly uh certainly fast forward, you know, some of those sort of exposed applications where you've got sort of limited resources.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I think we're definitely seeing seeing a concern in the market around making decisions as to whether you know they're jumping on the right AI um bus, whether AI is going to be a sort of satisfactory solution for them or give them a sort of silver bullet, as I mentioned.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think my analogy uh quite a while ago, and I'm sure I've bored you with it before, Elia, is you know, um with AI, it's so fast moving.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: Someone mentioned the sort of speed of speed of uh AI is sort of doubling every seven months now, whereas you know, hardware used to double every two years.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um but you kind of my analogy is you kind of got to pick on it pick on a bus and and jump on that bus um and perhaps cling on.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: And and if you see a faster moving bus, then then have that sort of open architecture and that sort of framework where you're not committed and and um you know you can you can adopt something else uh if it comes along.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_00: Well, when it comes along, probably more more relevant.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think that that helps to mitigate the the risk and uncertainty around you know getting started with things.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: I will say, you know, my analogy, which I don't think you've heard because I just thought of it, was uh you know, you can get the world's greatest uh uh engineer or mechanic for a 67 Corvette, and he wouldn't know what to do with a Tesla.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: And and I think that legacy tech is legacy tech.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, uh you you need to partner or onboard solutions that rather than trying to rebuild from scratch, uh, you know, it was a different era.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: And and to so to partner with modern AI native, uh, you know, open API-powered solutions is is uh you know, it's it's it's the future of enterprise.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and you know, we position ourselves as as sort of orchestrating um you know an AI ecosystem.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_00: The the key for us is is to be open um as as things change and evolve, um, but fundamentally be provide a safe um system as well and have all of those sort of guardrails um and uh security because we know that you know we see that with our customers where we're talking to our customers about AI, then you know, we get very rapidly um into conversations around you know changing our master service agreement and and AI schedules, uh et cetera, et cetera.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: So it's important for us to to not only have that sort of uh open and efficient uh ecosystem, but also safety.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_01: Definitely.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um Andrew, you have been very gracious with your time today.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_01: Uh anything else you want to discuss before we sign off?
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um no, I think I've uh uh it's been it's been great uh to be part of the uh podcast series.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um so uh and and you and I chat regularly.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I could have a conversation about the um the transfers going on in the English uh football league at the moment.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um and uh our uh podcaster is pointing because we share the same team, but I know you know zero about soccer because you call it soccer, not football.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah, nothing nothing else to say.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: Listen.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it just goes to show how many of these you've listened to, Andrew, because I believe I called it football on one episode, right?
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just I did hear that.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to be uh globally appealing to North Americans and Europeans alike.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I I'll I'll I'll close with a fun question.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: When are you going to come to Canada?
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's beautiful over here right now, you know?
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I've been to Canada uh a fair few times actually, but we haven't uh we haven't put that on the on the agenda and we must do that.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: I have been in uh I have been in Toronto uh in deepest winter, in the deepest snow, where I was particularly grateful uh to the sort of underground passages.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: So I'll try and avoid that.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um but let's see if we can get it.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_01: So our January quarterly meeting is off the off the table then, I take it.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think that's uh I don't think that's the most coming plan.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, great.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, Andrew, thanks so much for being on this week's episode.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, you can you can reach Andrew everywhere that you can reach me.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: So uh follow along with the uh with the ice tech LinkedIn pages, and uh yeah, you can catch this episode when it gets posted.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: Andrew, thanks so much, and we will talk again very soon.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: Great.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Elliot.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_00: Speak soon.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: Cheers.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_01: Bye.