Hays Intends To Explore International Growth Opportunities With Latest Acquisition

Law firm Irwin Mitchell has advised Diversity, Equity & Inclusion advisory organisation, Vercida Consulting, on its sale to global recruitment specialist, Hays.

Vercida Consulting was established by Dan Robertson and Morgan Lobb. Dan is an industry recognised expert and will continue in his role of Managing Director of Vercida Consulting, in addition to heading up Hays’ Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Advisory Service.

Hays will immediately seek to leverage Vercida Consulting as the front of its Diversity, Equity & Inclusion offering as part of its Advisory Services. Vercida Consulting is currently focused on the UK market, however, provides services through employees and an associate network in the US and parts of Europe. Hays intends to expand the business globally, targeting US and Germany.

Matt Smith from Irwin Mitchell’s Corporate team in Birmingham led the legal team advising Vercida. He was supported by Alexandra Bloomer, solicitor in Irwin Mitchell’s Corporate team, and colleagues in the firm’s Corporate tax team.

Expert Opinion

“One of the largest challenges facing the HR community at the moment are the issues relating equality, diversity & inclusion. Dan has over 25 years’ experience of working in this area and has spent the last 15 years supporting global businesses to help them transform ideas into action. Hays clearly recognise the expertise that is available to them through this acquisition and I’m confident they will form an effective partnership resulting in overseas’ growth.” Matt Smith, senior associate at Irwin Mitchell 

Dan Robertson, Vercida Consulting Managing Director, says: “The acquisition of Vercida Consulting by Hays will provide us with the ability to upscale what Vercida has been doing all these years, creating a more diverse world of work and developing inclusive leaders. We will now have the capacity to help far more organisations on their DE&I journeys, across the globe.”

“By offering an evidence-based approach to inclusive culture change, we can constructively challenge the existing organisational norms and ways of working.”

Alistair Cox, Hays CEO, says: “The world of work has undergone significant changes in recent years and the needs of our customers have evolved alongside that. One of the core pillars of our Group strategy is to deliver a broader range of workforce related services to our customers across the globe, helping them with their wider human capital and talent challenges, ultimately delivering more value to our relationship.

“The purchase of Vercida Consulting will increase our ability to deliver a host of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion services. The acquisition will allow us to have more meaningful conversations with our clients who, almost without exception, see DE&I as a significant challenge and want a partner who can help them in this area. The acquisition of Vercida Consulting is an important step in our journey to becoming a true Leadership Partner to our customers.”

Paul Winterflood (partner) and Katherine Stone (director) at Moore Kingston Smith also advised Vercida Consulting.