How does Gofore adjust it´s business to the rising boom of AI. Have you recruited AI talent and expanded your product offering to AI? Are the customers in general asking for AI solutions? What kind of opportunities could AI bring to Gofore?
Gofore seems to have expanded successfully to Germany and I must congratulate you for that. It´s definitely not an easy step to take. Since this seems to have gone successfully are you looking into new areas to expand to or are you focusing on growing in Germany & Austria? If you are focusing on the that area, what´s the growth strategy, organic or acquisitions?
What´s going on in Gofore Spain and Italy, I didn´t even know you had offices there!? Are they serving local clients or helping the teams in Northern / Middle Europe?
Thanks for the feedback! We’re also happy with our performance. If you have any questions, please post them and we’ll answer as many as we can. Swedish is also fine, but I will reply in English
What competence area do you think you´re stronger in than your competitors? Like, is there competences within your service that you feel you´re way ahead of competitors? Also, what areas do you think you would need to improve to keep up with your competitors?
Your eNPS score was lower during Q3, compared to H1/23. Has this reflected to employees leaving the company (more than usual) during the last quarter?
Hello @fredde and @Lillen! So sorry for being unresponsive; these notifications seem to go to my Junk folder so I must have accidentally deleted the one from Lillen’s messages. I will properly respond asap!
Det här med insynshandel, och speciellt på sälj sidan är nog en svår gåta att knäcka. Köpen brukar ju oftast vara positiva signaler…fast det finns ju ingen garanti att insiden förstår vad de håller på med, eller förstår vad börskursen redan prissätter.
Men om vi går över till detta case. EMK Invest som då sålde, är på ägarlistan på plats 13. De äger tillsammans 140 518st Gofore aktier (miinus dagens handel). Jag ser inte ännu jätte mycket dramatik i det att 15 000 aktier var sålda. Orsaken till att de beslöt sälja kan vi bara gissa. Men lönar sig säkert söka efter signaler om de säljer mera?
Faktiskt insåg jag själv för en stund sedan att jag borde titta på hans totala ägarandel, så sett ur den synvinkeln var försäljningen inte så stor, som du redan nämnde. Under det här och förra året har insiders köpt aktier i små mängder, men flera har sålt dem i stora summor. Dock bör man alltid beakta totala ägarandelar, som du redan nämnde tidigare.
Jag läste nyligen en artikel om framtiden för branschen, särskilt med fokus på aktörer i Finland. Ibland läser jag för många företagsspecifika nyheter när jag egentligen borde läsa om branschen som helhet också.
Problemet verkar delvis vara fortsatt löneinflation och brist på kompetens, men kanske inte på samma sätt som tidigare. Det blir intressant att se hur tillväxten lyckas i framtiden, både organiskt och oorganiskt. Många av oss investerare tror starkt på detta. Om det går bra med stora kunder och internationaliseringen fortsätter framgångsrikt, kommer det förmodligen gå bra.
Jag har höga förväntningar själv och från vad jag har hört och läst verkar många investerare dela den synen.
Dear Lillen, sorry to keep you waiting - here are answers tyo your good questions.
AI affects Gofore’s business in many ways, roughly from two directions. First is the customer side, with AI of course representing a huge technology driver for further digital transformation and investments. We believe this to be the single most important business opportunity for Gofore and the whole digital transformation consultancy industry. It is of course a challenge to keep our capabilities and value proposition up-to-date from hard-core AI and data science expertise all the way to eg. strategy consultancy to guide our customers in this technology leap. We have already built this capability for some years and will keep doing so.
Secondly, AI will have a huge effect on how all information workers do their own job and how we manage to stay productive. For eg. software developers, AI assisted work and tools are already part of their everyday work and the productivity leap when these tools become more mature will be huge. Same will happen to all other areas of expertise - AI will renew the way experts work and to be the best consultant, you need to use the tools effectively.
Thirdly, AI is a possibility for renewing Gofore’s internal processes. Sales, marketing, staffing, all important processes can be improved. Gofore has a strong digital platform for our community (including Goforeans and our network of partners) and we’ll keep improving that and are excited about AI possibilities.
Customers have on an average not yet reached the phase when they invest heavily into AI. At this point, it is more about experimental, proof-of-concept type of projects. But it will not take long for bigger investments into AI to become more commonplace and we feel we are ready for that.
Our strategy for now is to focus our growth on the DACH market. We are looking to grow both organically and inorganically. For the inorganic growth we have an active M&A pipeline in both our focus markets, i.e. our home market in Finland and the DACH area.
Yes, the operations in Spain and Italy are mainly there to support the business in DACH area and Finland.
We at Gofore think of this mainly in terms of customer segments (Digital Society and Intelligent Industry) and how me maximise the value to these specific customer types. To achieve this, we are constantly developing our capabilities towards a more comprehensive digital transformation offering. Individual capabilities and services are of course important, but in our thinking the differentiation and unique strength comes from the whole. That is also where we consider ourselves to be ahead of the competition, many of who are more focused on building their value proposition based on a specific capability. However, if we look at specific services, we could mention the more special ones, eg. change management consultancy (leading provider in Finnish market) and simulator technology for heavy/mobile machines (a very international service, part of our unique Intelligent Industry offering as digitalised product lifecycle).
Yes, important and regrettable finding. The times are certainly tougher than what we as company and community have gotten used to post-pandemic. Luckily, this has not meant that we have higher employee churn and more leaving employees. Our employee churn trend is still pointing downwards and total churn for Q3 (last twelve months) was pretty much on the target level of 10%. We do report attrition/churn regularly, also.
Thank you @emmiberlin for your answers!
As a shareholder I´m very pleased with your IR and how you report revenue each month.
I was surprised about the change management part! Do you mean like change management in general or change management in a digital context…well I guess today digital context should be taken into account in every company, but I mean do you do consultancy on like work place diversity etc. or just change management in a digital context?
I am writing now mainly based on information from November, but still contemplating. Gofore’s growth slowed down in November, and billing rates were relatively high. Apparently, the company needs cost-saving measures, if I understand correctly. Recruitment has decreased. I remember reading that the analysis firm Inderes expects organic growth to significantly slow down in 2024.
Has anything changed, or is Gofore now heading in a worse direction… at least compared to what has generally been expected?
Gofore’s revenue growth slowed organically in Q4, as expected, but profitability was well ahead of our expectations. Overall, Gofore’s strong performance in a challenging year demonstrates the company’s ability to adapt quickly to change and manage critical billing rates and profitability. We expect the company to continue to grow faster and more profitably than the sector in the coming years, even if the weak economy slows things down somewhat. The valuation picture (2024e adj. EV/EBIT 12x and expected return ~20%) is attractive.
It´s very easy to own Gofore. Just sit back and enjoy the ride
Sometimes, the market might however give opportunities to buy more. Might be one of those moments ahead?
From Joni´s great analysis:
However, the company is expecting a weak
Q1 due to slower demand at the turn of the year. Throughout the year, the focus will be on profitability, which the
company has managed excellently for years in the face of headwinds.
Många säger att Gofores aktie är dyr och sedan säger de att branschen fortfarande går nedåt och det finns inget ljus i tunneln…
Jag funderar också på att företaget förväntas mycket av och har ett utmärkt rykte. Om företaget inte längre presterar riktigt bra eller ens bra, utan bara som alla andra… hur investerare reagerar på det. Om medarbetarnas tillfredsställelse minskar; kompetens lämnar, då måste man locka med lönen - marginalerna minskar och omsättningen.
Företaget fungerar kvalitativt, medarbetarna är lyckliga så att de vill komma till jobbet och dessutom behöver företaget inte hålla mycket låga priser heller, vad jag har hört och läst. Gofore är vinnaren i sin bransch eller har åtminstone varit det, så jag är inte särskilt rädd för de risker jag nämnde.
Styrelsen för Gofore har beslutat om nya aktiebaserade incitamentsprogram för koncernens nyckelpersoner samt en riktad nyemission. (22.2.2024)
Gofore’s Board of Directors resolved on new share-based incentive plans for the group’s key employees and a directed share issue
The Board of Directors of Gofore Plc has resolved to establish two new long-term share-based incentive plans for the key employees of the Group. The aim of the new plans is to align the objectives of the company, shareholders and key employees in order to increase the value of the company in the long term, to commit key employees to work for the company and own the company’s shares as well as to offer them competitive incentive plans based on earning and accumulating the company’s shares.
Are they serving local clients or helping the teams in Northern / Middle Europe?
(22.2.2024)