At Zoholics, the UK event that has returned for the first time in three years to a physical meet-up, Zoho revealed its plans for the UK. The UK is a significant growth area for the company. It has seen 40% year-over-year growth in the country from what was already a substantial base. Over the last few years, it has gradually built an employee base, and it announced a new Bletchley office and plans for further expansion at the event. The company appointed Sachin Agrawal, Managing Director, Zoho UK, at the start of 2022.
Sridhar Iyengar, Managing Director of Zoho Europe, commented: “The UK continues to be a core strategic market for us and has so much untapped growth potential. It is our biggest market in Europe and one in which we have held customers for over twenty years, and we are driving to further strengthen our market position here. In a challenging economic landscape we are increasing UK investment and are well positioned to weather the storm.”
Agrawal will look to have doubled the UK headcount by the end of the year. Enterprise Times asked how many UK staff the company has now. Iyengar answered: “We have around 125-150 staff serving the UK market now.”
Is Transnational Localism coming to the UK?
This significant presence comprises sales, customer support and marketing staff. They will support the sale and service of more than 55 applications that make up the Zoho solutions portfolio. The themes at Zoholics included information about the strategy of Transnational Localism. This is Zoho’s programme to create self-reliant local communities and economies.
Enterprise Times asked Iyengar what ESG initiatives Zoho has in the UK. Iyengar answered: “ESG – we will add more as we grow but currently do not have specific ongoing initiatives aside from sporadically helping to educate around digital skills in different industry groups or some education establishments. In time, we will.”
A celebration of customers and partners
Zoho has built a strong following of customers quietly, without the huge investment in marketing and sponsorship that other vendors leverage. It has built a strong customer and partner base in the UK and added free online training programmes last year to boost its local partner ecosystem. It is not only about technology deployment, Zoho also supports training on how to assist customers in digitising their operations using Zoho applications. The press release cited three customers who joined the Zoho ecosystem last year or significantly increased their investment.
- ABL Group is a 400-strong global energy and marine consultancy that implemented Zoho CRM in 2021 and integrated it into Oracle NetSuite. Zoho CRM became the glue that helped bring a company that was created following the merger of AqualisBraemar ASA and the LOC Group. It replaced Microsoft Dynamics in one organisation.
- Reliance High-Tech is the UK’s leading independent security technology integrator and provider of lone worker protection services. It has implemented Zoho One and is leveraging Zoho Creator, the Zoho low-code application development platform.
- Tenet Group, the UK’s leading adviser support group, uses Zoho One for its operational processes. That includes the use of Zoho Backstage, the event management application.
Has Zoho completely arrived in the UK?
As a private company, its strategy differs greatly from most other vendors. It owns and operates its entire tech stack, including its data centres. This ecosystem has been built carefully with Iyengar noting: “We have a robust business model. Private ownership enables freedom for a long-term market view and stability, especially in times of economic turmoil. Entire ownership and control of our strategy and solutions means we manage costs and services carefully. We keep our promise of delivering consistent value to customers and partner with them long-term. We have no plans to exit and no plans for mergers or acquisitions. We continue to retain our direction, culture and values – a critical factor for companies when making vendor decisions and a reassurance to our existing customers.
“In the past 26 years of our operations we have been profitable every year and reinvested in product innovation and development in order to deliver market-leading solutions to rival any player.”
Data centres in Amsterdam and Dublin support UK users. The big question now that the UK is out of the EU is: Will Zoho build a data centre in the UK?
Iyengar replied: “We have no immediate plans for a London data centre and will keep you informed when we have any update there.”
Data sovereignty is becoming increasingly important for many companies, and this will likely become a bigger issue for UK organisations. Zoho is also planning to run this event across Europe, including Frankfurt, Germany, on September 13th. Data sovereignty is a bigger legal issue in Germany, and it will be interesting to see whether it makes any announcement next week.
Enterprise Times: What does this mean
For several years Zoho has been quietly growing its operations in Europe. This year, it has accelerated investment in the region when many companies are scaling back. What is unique about Zoho is the breadth of applications it provides. Each application is built on the same platform and therefore fits together seamlessly. The price point is also very attractive for many. It is missing a full ERP, though others have already built one using Zoho Creator, including ZBrains, a US partner.
