Sydney procurement tech venture Portt sells to UK software company

The sale comes just 14 months after the 11-year-old procurement tech venture raised $4 million in VC funding after a decade of bootstrapping. The funds were to tackle slavery risks in company supply chains as Modern Slavery laws came into effect globally.

Portt has been working in partnership with Advanced in the UK public and private sectors during a year of rapid expansion for the business. The acquisition is Advanced’s tenth since 2020.

The British software and services provider said Portt is the fastest growing provider of SaaS procurement, contract and supplier management solutions in Australia and New Zealand. It manages more than 63,000 private and public sector suppliers across ANZ for more than 9,000 clients, including the NSW Health, NSW Education Department and Super Retail Group.

Co-founded by co-CEOs Chris Holmes and Andre Pinkowski, the company has offices in Sydney and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

Holmes said they were proud of what Portt achieved over the decade.

“As a rapidly growing sourcing, contract, and supplier management platform, Portt believes heavily in the strength of innovation to drive value for the customer,” he said.

“Being part of the Advanced Family allows us to be a part of a best-of-breed financial and spend management software organisation, with our world class procurement technology, delivering a force multiplier to customers.”

His co-founder Pinkowski said the cultural fit between the two businesses is excellent.

“The acquisition will amplify what Chris and I have already worked hard to achieve, and we are confident that our people will jump at the great opportunity that exists being part of a larger organisation who share our values,” he said.

“Portt always had its eye on expanding outside of ANZ and given the commonwealth standards adopted in our solution the UK was the most logical place for us to focus. The combination of Advanced’s strong UK presence with ambition to grow in ANZ, and our solid footprint in ANZ with ambition to expand to the UK makes it a win win.”

Advanced CEO Gordon Wilson said Portt’s technology will deliver greater efficiencies and productivity to customers.

“This acquisition represents another significant step in our growth and international expansion strategy, building on our already successful footprint in Australia,” he said.

“This is an extremely complementary acquisition strategically as we focus on building out our complete ERP offering comprising Financial, Spend and People Management in both the UK and ANZ and another significant addition of world class innovative technology for our customers.”