Careers at Actiance

Mission

Actiance seeks to ensure the stability, efficiency, security, and functionality of commercial communications systems across multiple communications channels through a range of software products and solutions.

Founding story

Actiance was founded in 1998. The Company focused initially on the development and provision of call centre and customer relationship management solutions for instant messaging web chat and email channels. In its early years of operation, it worked closely with leading technology and web companies AOL, Yahoo, and Microsoft, with which it worked on the creation of the industry's first certified access programs.

Actiance continued to develop new and innovative solutions, launching its first compliance and security offering in 2001, specifically targeting banking and financial services clients that were obliged to operate within stringent government regulations. This solution enabled financial services companies to use public instant messaging networks from major providers for time-sensitive communications.

Having established itself as a leading provider of compliance and security solution to the financial services sector, Actiance continued to diversify its service offerings.

The Company now serves a broad range of industries with tailored solutions, including the healthcare, telecommunications, and energy sectors. Actiance has secured more than $43 million in three rounds of investor funding, most recently raising $28 million in 2015 from a group of investors led by Golub Capital.

Business model of Actiance

Customer Segments

Actiance provides a wide range of software solutions to commercial and institutional clients. The Company serves customers primarily across the following industries:

  • Banking and Financial Services, comprising various banking institutions – including the top ten banks in the US, financial services providers, and insurance companies;
  • Energy and Utilities, comprising energy companies across all segments of the energy chain, including oil and gas producers, transmission companies, and energy producers;
  • Healthcare and Pharmaceutical, comprising healthcare providers, pharmaceutical manufacturers, and pharmaceutical distributors;
  • Government, comprising government bodies and public institutions;
  • Technology and Telecommunications, comprising telecommunications companies, internet service providers, software developers, original equipment manufacturers, and technology companies; and
  • Retail and Consumer Goods, comprising manufacturers and retailers of consumer goods and other products, including grocery chains, department store chains, and other retail outlets.

Actiance includes a number of household names among its clients, including high-profile companies such as Coca Cola, Chevron, Sony, ConocoPhillips, BNP Paribas, and Verizon.

Actiance is based in the US and principally serves a domestic client base. The Company, however, also serves a number of international clients, including in Asia Pacific and Europe.

Value Propositions

Actiance provides value to its customers in the following ways:

  • Its reputation and track record, with the Company established as a reliable and popular provider of communications compliance solutions, with its standing exemplified by its ability to attract business from high-profile clients such as Coca Cola and Verizon;
  • Its range of services and solutions, with the Company offering a broad range of communications compliance, archiving, and analytics solutions across a broad set of communications channels and to clients in a diverse selection of industries;
  • Its proprietary technologies, with the Company utilising proprietary technologies to ensure that its solutions are unique, enabling it to set itself apart from other industry players; and
  • Its technical expertise and experience, with the Company employing highly-trained specialist personnel across its enterprise, as well as a team of experienced industry executives, enabling it to provide precise technical support and services.

Channels

Actiance operates a website at www.actiance.com, through which it provides information on its various solutions, services, target industries, and customers. The Company does not sell its products directly through its website. It does, however, allow customers to arrange software demonstrations through a tool hosted on the Company’s homepage. Once purchased, customers are able to access the company’s software solutions independently.

Actiance makes its sales through an in-house direct sales force, the members of which deal directly with clients. These sales personnel operate out of the Company’s international network of offices, spanning the US, the UK, and India. The Company provides support services through a dedicated customer support organisation.

Actiance additionally makes sales through a network of third party sales partners – comprising independent sales agents, local sales representatives, and value added resellers – which extend the Company’s own sales and marketing reach.

Customer Relationships

Actiance does not make sales to its clients on a self-service basis, despite its online presence. The Company allows customers to request software demonstrations online and access products independently once purchased, however, purchases must be made through the Company’s direct sales force. This allows the Company to consult closely with its clients in order to fully establish their individual needs, and tailor solutions appropriately.

Actiance seeks to establish ongoing, long-term relationships with its clients. To this end, it offers ongoing customer support through a dedicated technical support team, which customers are able to contact over the phone, via email, or through the Actiance Community Portal in order to access personalised assistance. Through the Company’s community portal, customers are also able to interact with other users, share ideas, and collaborate on problems.

Actiance additionally provides a range of online support resources to its customers, including FAQs, technical information, and maintenance guides. Customers can alternatively interact with the Company, and follow its corporate developments, through its social media accounts, including with Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Key Activities

Actiance is a software and information technology services provide, specialising in the provision of communication, collaboration, and social media governance solutions for commercial enterprises and institutions across North America, Europe, and Latin America. Actiance serves clients primarily through its software platform, which enables users to connect using unified communications, enterprise social software, instant messaging, social networks, and custom-built enterprise apps.

The Company also offers products such as Vantage, which simplifies management and compliance for enterprise communication and collaboration, and Socialite, which enables employees to use social networks securely from any device. Actiance is based in the US, with international offices in the UK and India.

Key Partners

Actiance maintains an extensive partner ecosystem, which ensures that the Company is able to provide reliable and effective solutions to clients. The Company organises its partners into three core categories:

  • Strategic and Technology Partners, comprising leading software providers and technology companies with which the Company develops and implements software functionality and solutions;
  • Value Added Reseller and Systems Integrator Partners, comprising authorised resellers and referral partners, as well as specialist systems integrators with which the Company collaborates on co-marketing sales projects and integration operations; and
  • Migration and Consulting Partners, comprising various technology and other consulting companies with which the Company works to identify appropriate strategies and developments.

Actiance also utilises a network of supplier partners who provide additional services, equipment, and tools that support the Company’s core software development activities.

Actiance includes a number of high-profile companies among its featured partners, including major technology and software companies such as Microsoft, Cisco, IBM, and Salesforce, and other providers, including Spredfast, Modality systems, Dimension Data, and CellTrust Secure Mobile.

Key Resources

Actiance’s key resources are its proprietary technologies and intellectual properties, its flagship software platform, its IT and communications infrastructure, its sales and marketing channels, its partnerships, and its personnel.

Actiance uses a range of proprietary technologies that are protected under patents or licensed from third parties in the development of its solutions. Searches of records published by the US Patent and Trademark Office identified several patent applications filed with Actiance named as assignee, including applications entitled ‘Application detection architecture and techniques’, ’ Techniques for dynamic updating and loading of custom application detectors’ and ‘Automating software security restrictions on system resources’.

Actiance also owns and or leases a number of physical properties that are key to its operations. This notably includes its international network of sales and administrative offices across the US, the UK, and India.

Cost Structure

Actiance incurs costs in relation to the development of its products and solutions, the development of its flagship software platform, the maintenance of its IT and communications infrastructure, the procurement of professional services, the operation of its sales and marketing channels, the management of its partnerships, the implementation of marketing campaigns, and the retention of its personnel. Actiance does not publish its financial figures, including costs and expenses, online.

Revenue Streams

Actiance generates revenue through the provision of communication, collaboration, and social media governance solutions, as well as other related information technology services. The Company derives its revenue under various sales and service contracts, with the Company reportedly offering solutions under three principal models:

  • Perpetual license, common for on-premises applications, requiring clients to pay an upfront sum to own the software or other intellectual property on-premises for a fixed term;
  • Software-as-a-service subscription, with software is accessed online, as opposed to installed on-premises, and payments made either on a per user or subscription basis; and
  • Commercial open source, with customers able acquire the software free of cost without having to incur any upfront license fee, but not being provided ongoing maintenance, upgrading, customisation, or troubleshooting services.

Actiance remains a privately owned company and as such is not obliged to publish its financial results online. As such, the Company’s annual revenue figures are unclear.

Our team

Kailash Ambwani,
President and Chief Executive Officer

info: Ambwani has served as President and Chief Executive Officer at Actiance since joining the Company in 2004. He oversees the Company’s overall strategic direction and serves as its key decision maker. Ambwani is an experienced technology entrepreneur and software services executive. In his early career, he founded and managed several software companies, including Gold Disk Inc, a provider of video editing and multimedia authoring tools. He went on to found Astound Inc, a provider of web conferencing and collaboration tools, where he served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. Astound Inc was later acquired by Genesys Conferencing SA in 2001, where Ambwani assumed the role of Chief Operating Officer, his last role before joining Actiance.

Naresh Bansal,
Chief Financial Officer

info: Naresh has served as Chief Financial Officer at Actiance since joining the Company in 2016. He is responsible for leading the Company’s various financial functions, including the operations of its internal audit, accounting, and tax units. Bansal began his career at a public accounting firm, where he served for several years as a senior audit manager. He went on to join Alpha Drugs Limited in 1993, where he served as Director of Finance for two years, before moving to Axil Computer Inc in 1996 as Controller. Bansal worked briefly as a senior consultant at Deloitte before joining ACCPAC, where he served as Corporate Controller and subsequently Vice President of Finance over the course of six years. Bansal went on to hold senior finance executive positions at Sage Software Inc, 24/7 Customer Inc, and Satmetrix Systems, before assuming the role of Vice president of Finance at Zscaler in 2012, his last role before joining Actiance.

Anthony West,
Chief Technology Officer

info: Anthony has served as Chief Technology Officer at Actiance since joining the Company in 2016, overseeing its technology development operations. He also serves as a director of Eastern Post Road Housing Corporation. West is an experienced executive, having held a number of information technology positions across multiple companies. From 1990 he served as Head of IT at Geo and Hydro Pty Limited, a role he held for more than five years. He joined Credit Suisse in 1996, where he held a range of positions of varying responsibility over the course of 20 years. This included spells as Vice President and Head of Global Web Services for America, Director and Global End User Messaging and Real Time Communications Tower Manager.