From New Zealand to Silicon Valley: Projectworks’ journey to global recognition

Pictured above: Matthew Hayter.

Kiwi start-up Projectworks has wasted no time in building a US presence after its highly successful Series A funding round. It’s a giant leap in a journey to achieving global recognition.

Prior to 2021, when Mark Orttung began searching the globe for a standout professional services automation software platform that would suit his California-based software outsourcing firm, he describes everything they trialled as “disappointing”.

Building their own in-house platform turned out to be a bad idea too.

“You think you’ll save money, but you can end up with a sub-optimal product and waste a lot of money and energy on it,” he says.

Mark was aware there was a large pain-point around professional services automation software back then – not just in the United States but also in the wider global market.

Fortunately, two-and-a-half years ago at an investor conference in Lake Tahoe hosted by US company Bridgewest Group, Mark met Wellington-based entrepreneur Matthew Hayter who introduced him to Projectworks’ – an intuitive and innovative software platform that’s designed specifically for delivering fit-for-purpose solutions for service companies.

Technically and architecturally, it reminded Mark of a product he had produced when he was COO and president of Bill.com – a company which built fintech solutions for SMBs.

He also had a lot of respect for New Zealand’s software development community, with Bill.com being one of Xero’s early partners.

“I had a very positive impression of what Xero had created,” he recalls, “and their approach to market.”

To cut a long story short, Mark loved the Projectworks product, liked the people, and he was invited onto the board.

“Being on the Projectworks board for a year and a half meant that I got to know the company and the leadership team really well, he says. “I consider that a luxury.”

Mark Orttung.

Ramping up the market

Nowadays the US-based CEO of Projectworks is focused on realising the huge opportunity that exists for Projectworks across the US. The market already represents around ten percent of the company’s business, and that percentage is expected to grow significantly in 2025.

Mark describes their strategy as a ‘vertical by vertical approach’.

“We’ve done a lot of work with software services firms and boutique management consultancies, as well as architecture and engineering firms.

“For one reason or another they all work in a similar way.”

With the US being such a massive country with multiple geographical regions, software developers have formed their own communities, explains Mark. “So, you can work those communities as a small sub-segment to gain access into the market.”

This strategy must be working, with new sales on the rise and potential partners showing interest in the platform’s strengths.

“It’s only natural that accountants and bookkeepers will want their clients to use a product like Projectworks,” says Mark. “It means that the results they see are much higher quality.”

In both APEC countries and the US, accountants and bookkeeping firms are now recommending the use of Projectworks to their clients, he adds.

“It’s early days, but that’s an area that will become very strong for us over time.”

Meanwhile, back in New Zealand there has been recognition of Projectworks’ rapid progress since launch. At the time of writing, the company had just been named a finalist in the 2024 Deloitte Fast50 and was waiting to hear where it ranked within the 50 companies.

Dealing with the distraction

Projectworks co-founder Hayter describes raising capital as a “massive distraction from growing the business”.

“You’re not doing product, or selling, but focusing on a whole different set of tasks which, while really important, is also a distraction from the day-to-day of the business.

“We’re lucky to have some great investors who believe in what we’re doing, as shown by them leading the recently closed follow-on funding round,” he says.

Having Mark join the company as CEO has provided an extra set of hands to make the whole process much easier too, he adds.

“Thankfully we’ve managed to continue growing through all of the distraction.”

Projectworks’ Matthew and Mark presenting.

The process of setting up in the US market has also provided the benefit of building what will be a platform for maintaining growth globally.

Projectworks is already established in five countries – Australia and New Zealand, the US, Canada and the UK – where in all markets the same four targeted verticals are very similar in how they’re structured and how they function.

“So, you could say that this all-work-less-talk approach of ours has just created a great platform for Projectworks to grow,” says Mark.

Matthew agrees. “We’re building a company for the long term. Building that infrastructure is an investment in building a big global business. Projectworks is very much a long-term play and we’ve got the team and the opportunity to achieve our goals.”

A tailored approach

Getting the brand off to a flying start in the US has required some important fine-tuning – not least of which the integration of Projectworks’ platform with accounting software such as Xero and QuickBooks.

“That’s just a requirement when entering the US market, where there is still a large proportion of the market using QuickBooks,” says Mark.

Making their product also compatible with QuickBooks may seem like a big ask, but as Matthew points out, “we were either clever or lucky, depending on how you look at it, but our product doesn’t deal with tax or payroll, which is generally what differs the most when you’re comparing country-to-country or state-to-state.

“There is very little difference between running a consulting firm in New Zealand, Australia, Europe and the US,” he says. “Projectworks has focused on what all our target markets have in common, in terms of needs, and providing the best integration in each local market.

“It allows us to provide a truly global platform without the challenges that an accounting or payroll platform might experience.”

A winning long-term outlook 

The success of Projectworks in the US and other global markets boils down to the huge amount of investment in the product.

“Looking at the whole founding team and at Mark, we’re all product people by trade,” says Matthew.

“Our long-term strategy is to make Projectworks the defining platform in the consulting space, just like Xero is now the defining platform in the accounting market.

“We’re the people with the product and the knowhow on how to run a services consultancy globally, and we want people to instantly think Projectworks whenever the word consulting is mentioned.”

Matthew says gaining a foothold in the US market hasn’t exactly been a cakewalk, but for him personally, having grown up in Gisborne idolising ‘Silicon Valley’ and the great software companies that have emerged from there, it’s satisfying to have reached the level they’re at today.

“We have a team on the ground there under Mark, we’re competing on the world stage and we’re winning.”