smarterwork restructuring brings VC support

According to chief executive Bruno Monteyne, the company's original breakeven target was Q3 of 2002, but the restructuring should see this brought forward to late Q4 2001.

The restructuring will see the company's French and Norwegian operations close completely, but according to Monteyne, there are still plans to try and keep the Spanish operations going if independent finance can be found locally, which would help transform the Spanish division into a proper subsidiary.

According to the company's press statement its online marketplace "will continue to service the requirements of its international customer base from offices in London, Munich and New York". This will now include large-scale on-site projects and standardised packaged services as well as remotely delivered online projects, but there will be a shifting of focus from a direct sales and marketing approach to third party partnership agreements, such as those already in place with Compaq, Active ISP, CompuServe and BT.

Monteyne confirmed that the restructuring would see 15 of its London staff being made redundant, plus a number of freelance and part time contracts terminated, despite admitting that in the UK things were slightly different than the other offices, with the company managing to win "larger contracts and more repeat business".

Asked if the restructuring would be enough to see the company through to break even next year or whether further funding may be needed subsequently, Monteyne was confident that no further funding would be needed. "We have the support of our existing investors who are committed to seeing the company through to break even," said the smarterwork chief executive.

The company's backers are Italian-based venture capital firm Net Partners, Index Ventures based in Geneva, and Wellington that operates out of Munich. Giuseppe Zocco, general partner of Index Ventures, one of smarterwork's investors confirmed the VCs' support saying: "We strongly believe in the smarterwork concept and remain fully supportive of the company and its management team."

According to Monteyne, "to date smarterwork has acquired 60,000 registered customers, including a number of leading Fortune 100 companies". "We now have a pool of thousands of suppliers to ensure rapid, expert fulfilment of our customers' outsourcing requirements and we have seen very substantial growth of our business, at a compound rate of over 100% per month with high levels of customer satisfaction, and excellent repeat business," said Monteyne.