Two new vice president positions have been created at iVendi, to support its growth ambition to double revenue within three years.
The new recruits join the company’s senior leadership team alongside five existing staff members who were promoted in March.
Dale Reed (pictured left) has joined the motor retail technology provider as VP product management. He has been working in IT for 30 years, starting as a software engineer and specialising in data aggregation and business intelligence before migrating into product management. For the last decade, Reed was employed by Insurtech, building telematics solutions designed to help understand driver behaviour.
Initially, he will be helping coordinate between business stakeholders and product teams to build a long-term roadmap that will deliver on iVendi’s growth plans both in the UK and into Europe. He will also be improving the company’s product processes in order to ensure the products the company delivers bring the highest possible value to customers.
Reed said: “iVendi is quickly expanding both in terms of opportunities and people, and we need a product roadmap that aligns with the business’s vision and strategy alongside good discovery, research and refinement processes. This will help smooth the path as the company further scales up to support its SME and enterprise clients.
“Understanding the impact of a new product initiative across dealers, lenders, consumers and others means we can validate an idea before we write a line of code. Making sure that idea is then disseminated to business and product delivery teams means people really understand the value of the work they’re delivering.”
John Cross (pictured right) has been appointed VP engineering. During a career spanning almost 25 years, he has worked in a wide range of industries – from video gaming to banking. His most recent experience was at IRIS Software Group where he focussed on replacing legacy desktop accountancy and payroll software with cloud-based platforms.
Cross will be working with the managers of iVendi’s team of more than 65 software engineers to drive best practice in engineering, processes and people leadership, as well as helping to define company level objectives and key results.
He said: “My main aims will be to support our development resource in order to optimise delivery of new features to iVendi’s product suite, especially in line with the needs of the new European markets we are entering, as well as helping to scale internal teams in line with the company’s plans for growth.
“All of this needs to be done while retaining the positive and inclusive ethos that is already in place here. iVendi has a strong cultural identity and one of the key ways that we attract and retain high quality talent is through simply being a very pleasant place to work. We are planning for rapid growth but are keen that we do so while retaining what it is about the business that makes it such a fun and interesting place to work. I’ll be helping make this growth journey as smooth as possible for our teams.”
Richard Tavernor, iVendi COO, added: “Our expansion targets, which we announced towards the end of last year, are aspirational but we have made a strong start and are confident that the addition of Dale and John to our team will help us to reach our goals. We now have an excellent, seven-strong team of VPs in place that means we are in good shape to grow.”
The company started its overseas expansion, in June, when it appointed new country directors for France and Spain.