Visitor management software provider Traction Guest was acquired by equity firm PSG. This note explains the details of the acquisition and explores how it can benefit all parties involved.
The merger and acquisition trend in the security industry continues. This time,
visitor management software provider Traction Guest was acquired by equity firm PSG. This note explains the details of the acquisition and explores how it can benefit all parties involved.
In December last year, PSG announced the acquisition of Traction Guest. PSG is a growth equity firm partnering with middle-market software and technology-enabled services companies. Traction Guest, meanwhile, provides
cloud-based visitor management and workforce security software.
Roger Lall, VP of Product Marketing at Traction Guest, explains the rationale behind the deal. “PSG shares the same view of the market as Traction Guest – we both see the complex challenges that risk and security professionals have to deal with, and we think there’s an opportunity to help companies reimagine how they approach safety,” he said. “PSG has a proven track record of scaling comprehensive software solutions like ours, so they bring not only financial backing but deep experience in developing category leadership, which is our goal.”
PSG made the acquisition in combination with ShieldCo, a PSG V portfolio company focused on building the visitor management space. The Traction Guest acquisition marks ShieldCo’s second investment – in September 2021 ShieldCo invested in Sign In App, a provider of workplace risk management software solutions.
“What’s most important for us, and for customers, is that Traction Guest’s product platform, branding, and team structure remain unchanged at this point,” Lall points out. “To SheildCo, Traction Guest represents a powerful set of technologies that address visitor management and other workforce security concerns which is the market that ShieldCo is looking to address. Our focus on complex enterprise challenges complements their other holdings like Sign In App, for example, which is more focused on the SMB space.”
Traction Guest does see opportunities to expand into other regions and vertical markets as a result of the acquisition.
“Traction Guest is based in Canada and has customers and staff around the world; however, the majority of our clients are based in the US. Through this acquisition we will gain access to other companies and infrastructures under the ShieldCo umbrella that can help us establish an immediate footprint in new geographic regions,” Lall said. “Similarly, while we serve a wide variety of vertical segments from technology to financial services, we do tend to have more traction in ‘physical’ industries – aerospace, automotive, pharmaceuticals, food and beverage, etc. Through this acquisition we’ll be able to tap into new experts and technologies that allow us to go deeper into different industries as well as explore specific certifications that might have been too large a resource constraint previously.
Market challenges right now and Traction Guest solutions
According to Lall, the market is now faced with a variety of
workplace and visitor management challenges, which can be addressed with Traction Guest’s solutions.
“We provide a workforce security platform that is easily integrated across a number of other tools in order to address visitor management requirements; health and safety controls; and critical outreach and alerting,” Lall said. “The platform is unique in that it is ‘low-code.’ This means citizen-developers, for example security leaders with no computer programming experience, can drag-and-drop features to customize their deployment. This allows organizations to standardize across the entire enterprise for consistency and compliance while still meeting the exact requirements of each location and user workflow.”
Especially, the platform can address the hybrid workplace concept, which has gained momentum amid COVID.
“Our unique low-code tool allows organizations to manage employees as visitors. When staff come to the office infrequently, and on ad-hoc schedule, the concept of a core employee cohort needs to evolve. Everyone now needs to be treated like a visitor and managed accordingly,” Lall said. “As an open and flexible platform, we’re helping our customers reimagine security to support these requirements -- integrating with employee access control tools, providing at-home registrations, synchronizing with HR databases, supporting multiple space-booking tools for physical distancing, etc. This is why we see the notion of a traditional VMS evolving into a more encompassing workforce security toolset.”
Traction Guest’s solutions are cloud-based, which offers additional benefits.
“This means clients don’t need to manage the ins-and-outs of the technology. Our clients, typically security leaders, don’t necessarily have the time or resources to deal with on-prem complexities - server crashes, software patches, etc. A cloud-based approach moves the technical responsibilities back to us, the vendor,” Lall said.