Smart50 rank: 22
Revenue: $3,390,248
Growth: 79.57%
Founders: Nicholas Beames, 36
Head Office: Victoria
Employees: 11
Industry: Information technology
Website: www.astutepayroll.com
Not content with owning recruitment firms, Nicholas Beames used his knowledge of the sector to service it.
Enter astutepayroll.com, which supplies timesheet software and outsourced payroll services to recruitment firms, freeing them from using paper time sheets and giving contractors 24-hour online access to their payroll data.
But it hasn’t all been smooth sailing. After spending $1 million on software, the GFC struck, causing the recruitment industry to stop in its tracks.
“As an entrepreneur I had a decision to make: do I put the new business on hold for a year or keep my head down and stay focused? I chose the latter,” Beames says.
Another challenge was finding the right business partner.
“I have always believed that a partner in business is best so I can focus on what I am good at and they can focus at what I am bad at,” he says.
“At various times over the years I have had four business partners and had to buy them all out but have finally found a business partner I look up to.”
The hard work has paid off: the six-year-old business brought in $3.39 million in 2010-11 and has more than 55,000 people logging on to its web applications every month.
Offices in London and Singapore offices will be opened next year.
