Skyfii wants to become world leader in global data intelligence

Skyfii Ltd (ASX:SKF) (OTCMKTS:SFIIF) is seeking to become the “global leader in data intelligence”, as it looks ahead to promising financial results from the June quarter.

The software business, which listed on the ASX in 2014, originally captured, analysed and visualised customer behaviour data through publicly available wifi networks, to provide retailers with actionable insights to drive informed decision making.

But it has since greatly diversified and is now able to deliver insights to its clients – which include major retailers, airports and even stadiums – across about 100 different data integrations.

The Skyfii 411

These days, Skyfii helps physical venues use data to measure, predict and influence visitor behaviour, through cloud-based software that allows clients to streamline their operations, drive marketing results and improve customer experience.

It is based in Australia, but also has offices in the UK, US, South America and South Africa with its technology deployed in shopping centres, airports, retailers, universities, in smart cities and in hospitality venues.

Skyfii CEO Wayne Arthur explained to Proactive how the company has garnered such a large and ever-expanding list of clientele.

“Though we started out providing insights gathered from use of public wifi, hence our name, over the last six years we’ve diversified to about 100 other data integrations, from things like security cameras to beacons, scanning technology to apps,” he said.

“We can provide physical venues with a comprehensive picture of the people moving in, around and out of a space, and we can pull all the different sources together into one software platform, providing a much more accurate and detailed view of their space, providing a greater understanding of the behaviour of people in those environments.

“We solve fundamental problems for physical venues, which traditionally have had to use three or four different platforms to manage things like security, public wifi, their POS, their CRM, the list goes on.

“We are agnostic and we integrate across every enterprise product in the market, so that means we can take care of all the above and more in one place, which reduces costs and makes it easier to manage the movement of people, as well as providing high-level insights that inform decision making around store setup, marketing and customer behaviour.”

Global pandemic? No worries

Arthur said Skyfii managed to emerge from 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic not only unscathed but in an even better position.

As venues were required to accurately count occupancy, Skyfii’s software gained another use case.

“We’re now deployed in around 12,000 venues around the world,” Arthur said.

“Demand increased during COVID for us because venues like supermarkets needed to be able to accurately count occupancy.”

Skyfii’s technology not only allows this but also gives clients the ability to create ‘heat maps’ to see where their highest levels of foot traffic are.

“We came out of 2020 stronger than we anticipated,” Arthur said.

“We weren’t immune to the market conditions and for three or four months we didn’t experience much growth, but if you look at it over a 12-month period, we’ve grown substantially.”

Impressive financials

Skyfii’s latest quarterly report, released in late April, showed a 24% growth in recurring revenue compared with the previous quarter, leading the company to forecast double-digit growth across all key metrics for the 2021 financial year.

It also made a key acquisition during the quarter in CrowdVision, a highly complementary US and UK-based AI, computer vision and video analytics company focused on airports, stadiums, transportation hubs and large-scale resort hotels and casinos.

“We see CrowdVision as a really key part of our growth story,” Arthur said.

“We will be focused on integrating the CrowdVision business into our core business over the following 3-6 months, and as people around the world receive the vaccine, and venues continue to reopen, we expect to see strong growth.”

Skyfii ended the March quarter with A$4.03 million in cash receipts, up 19% on the previous quarter, completed a A$10 million placement and recorded pro forma annualised recurring revenue of A$13.3 million.

It has forecast FY21 total revenue of up to A$16.5 million and recurring revenue of up to A$12 million.

- Daniel Paproth

Story by ProactiveInvestors