Convercent hasn’t been on the scene long but that hasn’t stopped them from a path of innovating and disrupting the GRC software market.  The Denver-based software startup shot out the gates early this year with 10 million dollars in venture capital and over 300 customers in hand on a torrid mission of growth and change.  Today the company announced the latest version of its core product just six months after the launching that has turned the compliance industry on its head.  Convercent has added predictive analytics to the mix, designed to help compliance officers see risk issues before they become a problem.  They also have added new actionable campaign elements designed to make compliance health something that can be redressed immediately when a problem is found.

Convercent prides itself on its revolutionary approach to things, that much was clear when I visited their Denver headquarters for a sit-down with CEO Patrick Quinlan.  The renovation of their headquarters in the Golden Triangle neighborhood of Denver was in its final stages at the time.  Completed with mostly Colorado-based and built materials and a place where a rock wall would soon be, the facility will soon hold 100 employees, double the number today.  The company was built from the combination of Business Controls, Inc. and Nebbiolo Ventures and Quinlan has been driving things at full throttle from the day he walked in the door.  The GRC business stands for governance, risk and compliance – and the software industry that has formed to deal with the issues of safety and ethic compliance runs in the billions of dollars.   Convercent’s opportunity emerged from the dearth of modern features in your standard big-box GRC software solutions.

Convercent is built to take advantage of social and mobile, to be data-driven, run from a cloud-hosted environment, be easy to use, and be absolutely polished.   Legacy GRC systems are hard-pressed to try and match Convercent’s out of the box thinking and rapid 5-week product development releases.  Quinlan states that a lack of direct compliance experience is one of their greatest advantages because this allows the team to assume nothing in their approach.  The result Quinlan says, is a distinctive product that is insanely easy to use, and is beautiful.  In terms of functionality, appearance and value, there’s little to argue as I saw the demo’s, saw them in mobile, and saw how flexible and simple Convercent’s powerful product really is.

The new innovations focus on two specific features, the first of which is called the REACH score.  REACH is kind of like a FICO score, and it allows customers to look at any segment of the company, by division, geographic, length of employment – anything.  It then displays how the company and its people are doing in matching up to the full regulatory and company standards at a glance.    That leads to the next new feature, which takes action for example when a score appears to be too low.  In as little as 45 seconds a compliance officer can compile policies, education, and testing into a single distribution and campaign that can be sent to anyone or any group in the company.  This is especially shines in global corporate situations, where there is much to be managed by region, division, roles, and languages.  From macro to micro in a handful of clicks, able to drill down on issues quickly, then act on them – these things help companies get better educated and understand policies better.

“We see Convercent’s role as empowering compliance professionals to keep a pulse on their culture and compliance health each and every day” said Convercent CEO Patrick Quinlan. “Modern compliance management starts with company values, corporate ethics and industry regulations and ends with a thriving and compliant business. To manage this end to end, we are dedicated to providing an incredibly easy to deploy, intuitive solution that can help compliance professionals train employees, pinpoint problems regularly and act on them immediately—ultimately becoming the linchpins of compliance success at their organizations and in their boardrooms.”

Convercent’s product is subscription-based on annual agreement and easy to try.  The company has seen a dramatic shift in target market in the last 90 days.  While they were previously focused on the mid-market, lately things have moved on to signing larger and larger clients.  This push into the enterprise can be expected to grow as the need for effective policy and education management is a growing focus where agile and effective solutions are sorely needed.  Many customers are coming in the door with policy and learning requirements rather than standard compliance, and Convercent is well-suited for those requirements.   

Convercent’s New Technology Gives Organizations Unprecedented Ability to Manage and Measure Compliance Health