Nature of the business: IT and business change professional services firm

Markets: US and UK

Contact information/Offices:
Offices in London, Edinburgh, New York

London: 1 Alie Street, London E1 8DE
eMail: [email protected]
Phone: +44 (0) 20 7480 0030
Fax: +44 (0) 20 998 9885

New York: 100 Church Street, 8th Floor New York NY10007
eMail: [email protected]
Phone: +1-212-504-2964
Fax: +917-398-1486

Edinburgh: 10 Lochside Place, Edinburgh EH12 9RG
eMail: [email protected]
Phone: +44 (0) 131 230 0104
Fax: +44 (0) 131 230 0105

http://www.xceedgroup.com

History:
Xceed Group was formed in 2003, bringing together experienced IT professionals who share the vision to build long term client relationships through the consistent and reliable delivery of professional IT services.

Xceed’s inception was triggered by the Board’s deep-seated belief that companies could be getting better value for their investment in professional services than they had previously seen during their careers in tier-one consultancy firms.

Xceed’s industry background is in financial services, telecommunications, media and energy, and core skills have developed from pure technology through to IT infrastructure and application integration and business change. Strong project and programme management remains at the core of the business.

In over 10 years of operating with a range of FTSE 100 and Fortune 500 clients, many with challenging IT programmes and architectures, Xceed Group has enjoyed consistent growth driven by recommendation and referral.

Products/Services Offered:

1. Integration & Separation
2. Business & Organisational Change
3. Portfolio & Programme Assurance
4. Testing Strategy & Execution
5. Implementation Management
6. Service Management Transformation
7. Data Network Optimisation
8. Data Centre Optimisation
9. Data Migration
10. Data Management & Maturity
11. Market Data Optimisation
12. End User Computing
13. Outsourcing Advisory Services
14. Interim Management

Company ethos:
At Xceed we understand the importance of working in partnership with our clients; the best results are achieved when we can accurately align our aims and goals with those of the customer.

Xceed consultants are highly experienced at working in heavily regulated environments and are practised at introducing and maintaining high levels of governance and reporting. However, when required and appropriate they also have the practicality to adopt pragmatic short cuts to hit tight deadlines or recover flagging programmes.

There are three core beliefs which are instilled in Xceed consultants and which differentiate our approach:

We integrate with the in-house team and share as much knowledge and expertise as possible by active mentoring and regular knowledge sharing. We aim to leave a legacy.

We act as though we are shareholders in our client’s business, treat their money as our own and take actions on the basis of what’s in the best interests of the client.

Our attitude is as important as our competency and means that it’s not just what we do but how we do it that makes the difference. We’re completely committed to delivering high-quality, low-risk change.

Our client induction process, the Xceed Way and People Framework combine with substantial support, training and development to ensure that we deliver to a consistently high standard, whatever the challenge.

We make it our business to fully understand our client’s business and deliver change that works now and for the future.

Key executives:
Xceed Group is owned and run by three board directors: Gary Stewart, John Casserly and John Turner.

Gary Stewart
Gary founded Xceed in 2003 and has over 25 years experience of running large-scale IT programmes, including a successful stint at a tier-one consulting firm. Gary works predominantly in the financial services, telecoms and professional services industry and has delivered complex global programmes in highly challenging environments. He has a wide range of technical expertise encompassing infrastructure delivery, application development and deployment as well as network operations. He is especially strong on data centre design, build, management and consolidation.

Gary operates in both IT and business-facing roles and delivers through strong influencing and negotiation. As well as working with clients, Gary is Finance Director for the Group and his focus area is strategic planning, budgeting, financial tracking and reporting.

John Casserly
John has over 30 years experience in the IT industry, including three years at a tier-one consulting firm. He is a specialist in data centres and service management and has deep experience in IT outsourcing, having led the technology programme that resulted in outsourcing the entire IT infrastructure for Deutsche Bank in continental Europe. John has served in a number of senior management positions across varied industries including investment and retail banking, insurance, telecommunications, media, manufacturing and the public sector. John served as Chairman and was a leading member of an industry forum for investment banks that focused on CIO level issues in and around the data centre.

An accomplished Board-level operator, John is an excellent communicator and is one of those people who not only “gets it” but can translate so that everyone else “gets it” as well. As well as working with clients, John is Sales and Marketing Director for the Group and his focus area is strategic planning, proposition development and major bid proposals.

John Turner
John chairs the main Board and operational meetings. With over 30 years experience in IT and business change management, John has an outstanding track record of delivering massive step-change across major organisations in the financial services industry. This includes running some of the largest integration programmes in the UK. He has personal experience of shaping and leading global programmes with budgets in excess of £300m and over 3,000 staff, involving both application and infrastructure change. John works with Xceed’s clients at CEO/CIO level to determine investment strategy, business vision and change programmes and is a renowned trouble-shooter. As well as working with clients, John is Operations Director for the Group and his focus area is strategic planning, central operational functions and Human Resources.

Major projects to note:
Xceed Group helped global payments processing firm WorldPay to construct the full technical infrastructure for its business following its acquisition by two private equity houses in 2010. WorldPay was previously part of RBS Group and thus faced the challenge of building its UK operations and constructing the physical and technical infrastructure it needed for its business from scratch.

While 149 skilled workers joined WorldPay from RBS Group, none had experience of building and managing large scale infrastructure, creating a knowledge gap that Xceed was engaged to bridge. Xceed helped to write a number of complex RFIs and drafted detailed RFPs covering everything from choosing a facility to every bit of kit in the building. After four months, the complete physical data centre infrastructure was delivered in record time.

Following the tremendous success of the initial implementation, WorldPay expanded its relationship beyond infrastructure and continues to work with Xceed Group today.