Silverpeak hosted its latest B2B software leadership dinner in London in February 2019. The event brought together 20 senior executives and board members from the software and SaaS sector. Below are the key conclusions.
About the B2B software leadership dinner
The dinner took place on Wednesday 6 February. Silverpeak, the technology investment bank, co-hosted the event. Their partners were Spectrum, the retained executive search and HR consulting firm for the technology sector, and technology law firm Wiggin.
Pietro Strada, Managing Partner at Silverpeak, said: “It was a wonderful dinner with the participation of 20 great executives and directors. I think it demonstrates the quality and maturity of the software and SaaS sectors in Europe. It is clearly a very healthy and strong market.”
The evening took place under Chatham House rules. Even so, organisers have since shared some key points of discussion.
Capital access and early-stage funding
Attendees agreed that growth-stage B2B software companies have access to significant capital. They also found early-stage fundraising considerably more difficult to secure.
Defining SaaS
Furthermore, major national and sectoral differences affect how companies adopt SaaS versus perpetual licences. In some cases, SaaS can mean different things to different people. For some, it relates to a company’s revenue model or payment terms — billed annually, quarterly, or monthly in advance. For others, it refers to delivery (multi-tenant, single-instance) and cloud hosting. In sectors such as financial services, SaaS can also raise concerns about data capture and storage costs.
Given these differences, business leaders agreed that the industry must do more to explain the characteristics and benefits of SaaS.
Metrics, discipline and measuring success
Ultimately, customer adoption and utilisation are the key success metrics for B2B SaaS companies. In practice, this requires key implementation departments across the business to align around shared goals. SaaS providers must also follow good business disciplines. These include understanding clients’ needs and building products that address them.
The group also agreed on some common KPIs for SaaS companies, such as LTV, CAC, and churn. However, the way companies calculate these metrics can vary. In particular, senior managers should be able to calculate these figures and present them in the context of their own business.
From the room
Finally, Silverpeak director David Bell noted that attendees had lively discussions, reflecting the dynamic nature of the sector.
“We had a wide-ranging discussion,” said Bell, “covering the commercial, operational and financial challenges facing B2B software businesses across diverse verticals and stages of maturity. And somewhat surprisingly, there were even some impromptu contractual negotiations taking place in the room.”