Daniel Maskell appointed Chief Operating Officer

Daniel Maskell, Chief Operating Officer, discusses his newly appointed position and growth within his career at Novellus Finance.

I am delighted to be announced as the new Chief Operating Officer of the Novellus group. This is a significant personal milestone, and I am grateful to our CEO, Billy McManus, for trusting me in this role.

I have worked for Novellus for four years. I initially joined the business to support the delivery of an enterprise lending software platform. My background is in delivery management. I worked in Financial Services for almost 15 years before joining Novellus. I was attracted to the role as it gave me a unique opportunity to work on the development of a software solution from the ground up. Usually, my roles were focussed on implementing software off the shelf. What Novellus were trying to achieve was ambitious, and I was excited about being involved in such a project.

I was the fourth permanent employee at Novellus at the time of joining. As is typical of a smaller business, my role expanded quite quickly as the business grew. I have always been struck about the attitude of everyone at the company. We never viewed ourselves as a ‘small’ business. We tried to make sure that as we grew, we operated the business to the highest standards and never deprioritised quality to focus on growth. That’s not the culture we have. It’s how we continue to judge ourselves to this day.

With growth comes opportunity. I have found myself becoming involved in work a little less familiar to me. There has been plenty to learn, but it has been a fascinating journey as the business has evolved.

Not everything has been plain sailing. The original iteration of the software product did not go to plan as the complexity of such an ambitious project development impacted costs and timelines. We are fortunate that Billy is such a strong believer in what we’re trying to achieve, and we have embarked on a similar project which will focus on making Novellus better as a business. I’m confident we will achieve our goals. Our clients will hear more about this in 2025.

The company has grown at an impressive rate. Our first full year was 2018/19, making just shy of £200,000 profit with revenue of ~£480,000. By 2023/24, our loan book had grown to ~£200m (currency adjusted). Our latest accounts show revenue has increased to ~£25m with an average drawn balance of ~£160m (currency adjusted). We now employ 25 people in the UK & Ireland. That is impressive by any measure. That isn’t to say that there has not been bumps along the way. Billy wrote a very honest blog last summer where he spoke about some of the missteps made during our journey, but we will learn and become better because if it.

However, the last four years has been very positive. I am pleased to have contributed to the growth of the business, and I look forward to seeing how the business continues our impressive trajectory over the coming years.