The appointment is a key signal to investors that EVS is scaling up for further growth in the North American market. Image: Supplied
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The appointment is a key signal to investors that EVS is scaling up for further growth in the North American market.
Diversified environmental technology company Envirosuite (ASX:EVS) has caught the attention of investors with its ongoing expansion into global markets this year.
And this morning the company announced another key step forward, with the appointment of senior US-based executive Aaron Lapsley to the role of Chief Operating Officer (COO).
Along with a high-level engineering background, Lapsley will also leverage his career experience to play a key role in corporate strategy.
Accompanying the announcement, Lapsley caught up with Stockhead to discuss his appointment and his rationale for joining the business as EVS embarks on an exciting global growth phase.
Prior to joining EVS, Lapsley was the founder and CEO of System2 Consulting – a consulting and engineering firm that works with real estate owners and developers to improve building performance and occupant health & safety.
Before launching System2, Lapsley built a successful engineering and consulting career which culminated in the role of Head of Digital Buildings Practice at global real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield.
In that role, he also served as a Director of Google’s office portfolio, deploying smart-building solutions across the tech giant’s extensive property holdings in the San Francisco bay area.
Lapsley holds a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Oklahoma and also earned his MBA from Harvard Business School.
Speaking with Stockhead, Lapsley said his engagement with Envirosuite was strengthened earlier this year when System2 was commissioned for a market strategy project with the group’s EVS Water division.
Following the success of that project, Envirosuite CEO Jason Cooper invited Lapsley to carry out an expanded review of operations across the company’s multi-channel customer and product suite.
While System2 was growing fast, Lapsley’s engagement gave him additional insight into the exciting opportunities in front of EVS.
“That process provided me with a really detailed lens to get an understanding of what’s happening across every function in the organisation.”
And he liked what he saw.
“What’s exciting for me is that Envirosuite is a company that’s at such a unique point right now in the context of its recent history,” Lapsley said.
“It’s been through a period of consolidation and integration. And I know from experience that those changes take some time to bed down. But what’s emerged is a business which is at an inflection point now to execute on a lot of opportunities over the next two or three years.”
In his role as COO, Lapsley will report to Envirosuite CEO Jason Cooper and remain based in the Americas region where he will actively pursue opportunities in the company’s largest and fastest growing target market.
Assessing Envirosuite’s business model, Lapsley said its public listing on the ASX is one aspect that gives it a unique competitive advantage.
“In US capital markets, what an IoT technology company like EVS looks like today is probably a Series B or Series C startup,” Lapsley said.
In other words, a business model with established revenue growth that’s scaling up for its next phase of expansion.
“EVS has been growing quite fast, but then you add in the layer that it’s already publicly traded, and it’s really interesting.”
Having worked with IoT startups before, Lapsley said there’s not always alignment between a company’s healthy organic growth and the explosive top-line revenue growth VC investors expect.
“In that sense I think Envirosuite’s listed structure is a huge strategic advantage because it allows the company to grow in line with a simpler metric – returns on shareholder capital,” Lapsley said.
Getting more specific, Lapsley added that his skillset will also be advantageous in building out Envirosuite’s end-to-end product offering across its different technology suites.
As an example, he highlighted the company’s in-house supply chain management teams across its core product verticals, including control platforms for air quality and noise quality.
“I’m really looking to leveraging some of the great things those teams are doing and turning them into a real growth engine,” Lapsley said.
I’m not necessarily a supply chain expert, but where I’m most useful is that I understand how our technology works across the value chain — what it’s doing for EVS customers and how it’s going to be applied.”
“So I can bring that lens to make changes that align to EVS’s staretgy, and a good example is in inventory management – not always trying to run everything just-in-time, but holding enough inventory to maintain a resilient supply chain for our high-touch customers who are really dependent on the end-product.”
And as EVS scales up globally, Lapsley will play a key role in an environmental technology that by its nature operates across diverse geographical markets.
“If you look at our revenue by regions, its roughly even across our three global jurisdictions but the growth is currently fastest in the Americas,” Lapsley said.
“So there’s an increasing competitive advantage in being able to operate effectively across globally distributed team environments.”
“In that sense, I think bringing my appointment as COO in a region that’s outside the traditional home base of the business is a real signal to the market that we’re going to be a global team, and we’re going to deploy the right resources to support those key areas of growth.”
This article was developed in collaboration with Envirosuite, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.
This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.
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