APEX Analytix Receives Venture Capital
Greensboro, North Carolina - July 9, 2003 - APEX Analytix, a 15-year-old Greensboro firm that helps client companies recover money by auditing transactions, said this week it has received $7 million in venture capital to expand its business. The money, a rare infusion of venture capital for the Triad, came from Noro-Moseley of Atlanta and the Wakefield Group in Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham.
“It will help us grow across the U.S., setting up other offices over time as well as helping us start to grow internationally,” said Michael Lustig, hired in December as APEX’ chief executive. Lou Ann Flanders-Stec, fund executive for Piedmont Angel Network, said she considers APEX’ venture money “quite significant.” Venture capital awards have been hard to come by for nonbiotech firms in the Triad, she said.
“The main thing that (the APEX award) means is that people outside our area are starting to notice we have good deals,” said Flanders-Stec, whose fund invests in early stage and startup companies. In the Triad, she said, $7 million in “relatively large” for a nonbiotech firm.
APEX, with offices at 3859 Battleground Ave., has 75 employees, about 70 of whom are in the Triad. It also has small offices in California and Pennsylvania. The company expects to use the money for aggressive product development, sales and marketing programs, establishing strategic alliances and acquisitions, APEX said in a prepared statement. The company, founded by Jim Arnold in 1988 as a one-man operation, now has client list that includes 25 of the Fortune 100 companies the statement says.
APEX, which started out as JBA Consulting, focuses on the accounts payable and procurement sides of the business. It analyses a client company’s transactions, looking for anomalies and errors that cost the company money. APEX earns a percentage of what it recovers. The company also compares a client company’s contracts with the related transactions and, again, looks for anomalies and errors. That cost the company money. But APEX goes a step further, providing special proprietary software that can help clients guard against a repeat of the errors. “We began to explore outside funding as a means to fully leverage what we feel are significant market growth opportunities,” Arnold said.