Yorkshire anti-money laundering specialist SmartSearch has reported record growth driven by demand for its online ID check and due diligence platform.
The Ilkley based firm’s electronic verification technology can screen new and existing clients without the need to meet in person, and can can identify legitimate clients in two seconds after taking details including name, date of birth and address.
The firm said it increased business by 23% during 2021, with turnover year-on-year rising from £11.8m to £14.5m.
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Over the period the firm also added more than 800 subscribers, growing the overall number from 5,012 to 5,874.
It also significantly increased the number of employees from 109 to 181.
Managing director Martin Cheek said: “These record results for 2021 come in the context of a 77% increase in turnover at SmartSearch over the past three years.
“This growth reflects a surge in demand for our state-of-the-art technology, especially from regulated companies, as they seek an effective solution to the dramatic rise in attempted fraud and money laundering since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“We are now focusing on building upon this growth, and SmartSearch’s strategy for moving the business forward will be driven by our new CEO Guy Harrison, who has joined us from Dow Jones.”
SmartSearch launched its electronic anti-money laundering (AML) platform in 2011, and since then has developed and refined its technology and to enable clients to accurately identify and verify their customers.
It said the system makes it virtually impossible for a fraudster to use a fake identity, as it conducts identity checks using a combination of credit reference data and trusted public sources.
The Ilkley-based company, which won a Queen’s Award for Enterprise, was recently chosen to provide customer verification by Alto, which is part of Zoopla and provides cloud-based software for estate agents.
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