Blue Prism raising £100m to accelerate global growth

(Sharecast News) - Robotic process automation provider Blue Prism Group announced a proposed placing with new and existing institutional investors to raise approximately £100m before expenses on Thursday, to accelerate its global growth and further strengthen its balance sheet.The AIM-traded firm said the robotics process automation (RPA) market continued to experience rapid global growth, alongside increasing levels of customer adoption and sophistication in their approach to RPA.That was demonstrated by the group's growing commercial momentum, both in new customer numbers and upsells across existing customers, industry analyst commentary about the future scale and growth of the market, as well as by the investment activities of other RPA providers.The group said it was seeking to capitalise on the market opportunity available by accelerating its investments in distribution, its product and platform whilst maintaining its thought leadership in the RPA market.Blue Prism said it saw an expanding global opportunity for its software, with group revenue growth for the financial year ended 31 October of 96% in its most established geography of Europe, Middle East and Africa, 137% in the Americas, and 294% in Asia-Pacific, its most recent geography.The group said it currently had offices in nine countries to support that global demand, with growth driven from both new customers as 528 customers were added during the 2018 financial year, and from upsells, where existing customers purchased new licences to expand their 'digital workforce'.In total, the group had 723 upsells across 310 customers during the 2018 financial year.To further support that global growth opportunity, the company said it saw potential to open offices in new geographies such as the Middle East and Scandinavia, where there had been a growing take-up of the group's software, as well as additional locations in the Americas and Asia.There was also an opportunity to expand the group's sales and marketing activities in existing geographies.The directors anticipated that approximately half of the net proceeds of the placing would be deployed to underwrite the company's global growth activities and product development, with the balance being used to further strengthen its balance sheet and provide Blue Prism with the financial flexibility to address new opportunities as they emerged."Over the last year we have made significant progress in scaling and developing our business to address the compelling market opportunity we see ahead," said chief executive officer Alastair Bathgate."We continue to deliver strong revenue growth - supported by ongoing commercial momentum, product development and investment in our people - by helping both new and existing customers drive value with our transformative technology."Bathgate said the funds raised a year ago had enabled the company to expand its global reach, and reinforce its competitive advantage through "exciting" innovations like the Blue Prism Digital Exchange, its online marketplace."The proceeds raised via this placing will allow us to accelerate further, as we continue to invest in our people, product and processes to support the next stage of global growth."