Introducing LaunchPad: The Management Consultancy for Ad-tech Scale-ups?

We interview our CEO and co-founder, Guy Jackson, to understand a little more about how LaunchPad came to fruition, and what the future holds for the business.

1. How did the LaunchPad idea come about?

Launchpad was an evolution rather than an idea. After years (potentially decades, but that would reveal my age!) of working in several high-growth businesses, you get a real sense of how businesses operate, whilst an understanding of both the importance of empowerment and entrepreneurial spirit. It’s no easy feat, to launch a new business and it takes a huge amount of passion and patience to do so. In fact, According to the latest data, up to 90% of startup businesses fail, and across almost all industries, the average failure rate throughout years two through five is a staggering 70%.

Several factors will hinder many in their journey to success; from external economic disruption to market maturity and adoption. Yet, with those somewhat obvious obstacles removed, many of the challenges faced by AdTech leaders today are centred around the lack of process and oftentimes dysfunctional leadership team structure.  Scale-up businesses need to move fast and leaders need to have the conviction to make decisions whilst creating and leveraging collective alignment and strategy often suffers as a result.  

It was during a fast-paced period after Teads sale to Altice and the subsequent 4-year earn-out when growth requirements and heavy expectation was so intense that I was able to appreciate everything that made a business scalable. Whether that be through its ‘Sales-first’ culture, the technology infrastructure, its finance and funding, as well as operational practices.  All these moving parts are valuable in their own right, yet only make sense when underpinned by a solid strategy. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts if you will. 

And that strategy piece can often be hard to navigate – especially when you are too far into the weeds of the business. Hence the launch of LaunchPad.

2. What is the core mission of LaunchPad and what makes it unique?

In its simplest form, LaunchPad has been designed to deliver transformative growth for AdTech businesses. It is all centred around the ability to deeply analyse the parts of an AdTech company and, then build a robust strategy to optimise its delivery in a way that maximises its potential for scale.  

In terms of what makes us unique, I see this as a two-pronged answer. 

Firstly, the founding team (including myself) and our want to never stop learning:

When I was launching the business alongside my co-founder, Remy Wasyluk, I heavily invested in myself by way of further education that gave me an academic basis for my work. I undertook a diploma in Management Consultancy to learn about in-depth business strategy practices, and then later went on to complete a mini-MBA in product strategy, which was invaluable in understanding the requirements of technology businesses to focus on and efficiently deliver customer value.  

Secondly, the LaunchPad model:

The LaunchPad business model acts as a new kind of management consultancy layer; one that provides a variety of bespoke specialisms, from consultancy services and system integrators to commercial and strategic direction. Our thorough consultancy process – combined with an incredible network of subject matter experts – sets us apart from the traditional consultancy business model. This crossover of professional backgrounds, collaboration and exposure to different areas of AdTech puts us in a very unique position within the industry.

3. What areas of AdTech excite you the most, and which projects make you tick?!

What excites us as a business is the requirement for change.  The prerequisite for change is nearly always disruption, and that disruption usually comes from one of two areas:  

• Technological Innovation:  This could be areas such as the emergence of new technologies that render a lot of old technologies obsolete and therefore require fast adaptation of market players (the mass adoption of generative AI will be a huge example of this).    
• Best (better) practice:  This disruption could be caused by a core industry update (e.g. Google killing cookies from Chrome), a major agency taking a certain stance and pushing a certain initiative (e.g. marketplace SPO), or even government directives such as the GDPR.

I’ve become almost philosophical about the innate nature of change and its importance in both personal as well as business evolution.  It’s always been required, however I believe that we are entering a new era of acceleration that is going to reshape the way that we act and operate as both people and businesses to meet the needs of the future, a future that is only around the corner.  

As humans, we are pre-programmed to seek comfort and safety in familiarity and this means that growth can be quite an uncomfortable experience.  I’ve put a lot of work into myself personally – as well as in the strategies that we deliver to our clients – to embrace change and challenge every area.  

It’s the breaking down of barriers that makes me tick; seeing potential and growth in individuals and numbers is my passion.  Working with a client to move past the obstacles that once hindered them, is a very powerful thing.