CEO Today Global Awards

52 UNITED KINGDOM www.ceotodaymagazine.com CEO Today Global Awards 2020 DARREN ROOS Chief Executive Off icer, IFS Darren Roos is Chief Executive Officer at IFS. The Company develops and delivers cloud enterprise software for 10,000+ customers in over 50 countries around the world that manufacture and distribute goods, build and maintain assets, and manage service- focused operations. Since joining as CEO in 2018, Darren has transformed the company to deliver 20% growth year-on-year and reoriented it to put customer experience at the heart of its operations. With its portfolio of enterprise resource planning (ERP), field service management (FSM) and enterprise asset management (EAM) solutions, IFS is growing at three times the rate of the market. Darren has earned a reputation for hard work, building talented teams and prioritising customer focus over a 20-year career in growing and scaling global software businesses. Prior to joining IFS, he was the President of SAP’s global ERP Cloud business, where he had end-to-end responsibility for all product and go-to- market functions, and an organization of over 5,000 staff. He also held other leadership roles including General Manager of Northern Europe and Chief Operating Officer of EMEA. Prior to SAP Darren was a senior executive at Software AG, where he was President of EMEA, APJ, LATAM and a member of the Executive Board. A respected thought-leader and Cloud expert, Darren is a regular media spokesperson on channels such as CNBC and Bloomberg TV. Darren is also a Board director at Acumatica and at Trustopia. Having grown up in South Africa, and with a third of the IFS workforce based in Sri Lanka, Darren knows first-hand the sound case for diversity in driving a successful business and has made a bold commitment to it; he has expanded the percentage of women on his leadership team from less than 10 per cent in 2017 to over 40 per cent in 2019. Based in the UK, when not at work, Darren puts his energy into enjoying time with his wife and three children. linkedin.com/in/roosdarren | Twitter: @darrenroos www.ifs.com Over 10,000 customers around the world have chosen IFS as their business transformation partner because it’s different. Part of the reason the company is growing at three times the rate of its competitors is the way IFS does business. It doesn’t believe in software vendor lock- in and compliance audits, for example. It does, however, believe in choice. Bringing a compelling alternative to the legacy mega-vendors, IFS offers choice in implementation partner, choice between cloud or on-premises and choice of technology specification. It is essentially making boring software exciting again and serving as a catalyst for change in the enterprise software market. The market is marred by examples of protracted IT implementation cycles and project failures which is understandable given that many of the legacy software mega vendors openly admit a time-to-value of 3-5 years. IFS helps organizations to stay competitive and relevant by pushing a value agenda nearer one year than three, and that is meaningful to them. In a world where timing and agility is a critical survival factor, IFS likes to think of this as the two-year advantage. Firm Profile