Advanced Computer Services - Part Two

(By Richard Holway 8.00am 28th Apr 09) Further to our coverage of Advanced Computer Software’s results (Click here), I had the opportunity for a lunch with CEO Vin Murria yesterday. Vin was the COO at Kewill and I got to know her at Elderstreet where she did a pretty amazing job as CEO of one of our investments – Computer Software Group - undertaking 16 acquisitions and boosting the share price from 15p to 150p.

Now, of course, the hope is that Vin (and Michael Jackson as Chairman) will do it again at ACS. Rather than in membership systems (as at CSG) the application now is in Healthcare starting with Primary Care. The first acquisition, Adastra, has provided the first step. Adastra has c95% of the Out of Hours (OoH) market in the UK and 50% of the walkin clinics.

The ‘Murria Model’ is to move into adjacent areas by a combination of organic growth and a series of acquisitions. The adjacent areas this time run from Polyclinics (obvious) all the way through to GP Practices (currently EMIS territory)

Organically, I was pretty impressed with their new iNurse application. A pda-base call handling, scheduling, allocation, GPS tracking and reporting system for district nurses and community workers.

Inorganically, I got the sense that a medium-sized acquisition was imminent – maybe within days. Vin says that she has identified over 100 potential targets – most sub £1m. The vast majority of smaller companies in this space as ‘lifestyle’ companies. Vin has a reputation of turning such lifestyle companies to focus on shareholder return. Sometimes that change can be brutal and doesn’t always make Vin ‘Little Miss Popular’.

But the track record is now proven. I will watch the repeat performance with great interest! ACS shares are already up 60% in the last six months.

Note - Richard Holway is a general partner at Elderstreet.