Sixteen proof-of-concepts
What a deal is probably worth, how big the market actually is, how much of it they can currently touch, and what a comms plan sized to that would cost. The measured parts are marked; the model is a strawman.
No human has read a word of this. Machine output, published raw so the reasoning can be attacked before anyone polishes it. Judge the chain, not the copy — if a numbered step is wrong, say which.
What competitors actually charge
Duco publishes a full price card measured
On AWS Marketplace, with contract terms:
| Dimension | Includes | Cost / 12 months |
|---|---|---|
| License & Processing | Daily ingestion of 100K records, 50 process inputs, 25 users, 4 hours professional services | $80,000 |
| Volume increases | Metered, per 100K records/day step up to 500K | $40,000/step |
Ladder: 100K → $80k · 200K → $120k · 300K → $160k · 500K → $240k. And: "up and running within a day of contract signature."
Xceptor's contract, backed out of their ROI derived
Their own award post: "220% ROI, with the initial investment recovered in just four months · $1.083 million in labour cost savings, reducing annual costs to $217,000." Four-month payback on $1.083m implies ~$361k invested. Cross-checked against the IDC case — 523% ROI, $1.35m annual savings, three-year convention — gives ~$217,000/year. The same figure appears in both cases independently.
SmartStream sets the ceiling: Tier 1 case studies projecting $64m, $38m and $24m in three-year savings.
What a Fund Recs deal is worth modelled
Fund Recs publishes 2.2bn rows a year — ~8.8m rows/day across all clients. Divided by ~60 clients that's ~147,000 rows/day each, squarely in Duco's $80k–$120k band. Both companies' own published numbers, same unit.
| Tier | Who | Clients | ACV | % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Embedded / strategic | Apex, Maples, Northern Trust, CACEIS, CSC, SuMi Trust | 6–8 | $400k–$1m | 45% |
| Multi-module | Grant Thornton, Curo, Innocap, Channel, Waystone | 15–20 | $120k–$250k | 30% |
| Single-regulation land | Muzinich, Tycho, Serone, GemCap, Albar, Three Rock | 35–45 | $35k–$80k | 25% |
| Total | ~65 | ~$154k avg | $10m | |
The market is small enough to write down
| Segment | Buying units | Named people |
|---|---|---|
| Depositaries / trustees (EU + UK) | ~120 | ~350 |
| Fund administrators (global, mid-market) | ~350 | ~1,000 |
| ManCos / Responsible Entities | ~450 | ~1,100 |
| Asset managers with reporting obligations | ~600 | ~1,200 |
| Audit & advisory (channel) | ~25 | ~120 |
| Total | ~1,545 | ~3,770 |
Fewer than 4,000 people on earth can buy this. You don't run demand generation against 4,000 people — you run coverage. Every one can be named and tiered. directional estimate
How much they can currently touch measured
LinkedIn, measured directly: 60 associated members. 18 Engineering · 11 Information Technology · 11 Consulting (Client Solutions) · 10 Business Development · 4 Product Management. 52 of the 60 are in Ireland — 27 Greater Dublin, 12 Waterford — selling into 40+ countries.
Named commercial: Gerard Gilsenan (CRO), Shane O'Sullivan (Senior Sales Director), Des O'Donohoe (Co-Founder & MD), Shane Flatman (Strategy & BD, APAC), Aoife Storey, plus Meaney.
What growth actually requires
$10m ARR growing 49% → ~$4.9m net new ARR
assume 60% expansion / 40% new logo
→ new-logo requirement ≈ $2.0m
÷ ~$154k ACV = ~13 new clients
93% PoC-to-close → ~14 PoCs. Call it 16/year — 1.3 a month.
16 PoCs ← ~50 qualified opportunities ← ~200 first conversations
← ~1,000 engaged contactsThey don't need to be famous. They need a thousand of the right people to know they exist.
| Tier | Scope | How, and how often |
|---|---|---|
| 1 · named | 40 accounts ~120 people | 15 largest administrators, 15 largest EU/UK depositaries, 10 strategic ManCos, plus expansion accounts. Bespoke pages, Meaney or Gilsenan direct, executive dinners at InvestOps and Irish Funds, Adminovate as the relationship instrument it already is. Monthly touch, quarterly substance. |
| 2 · clustered | ~200 accounts ~600 people | Clustered by regulator, not by size: CBI ManCos · CSSF · ASIC REs · APRA trustees · UK AFMs · EU depositary leads · EMIR reporting heads. A regulatory deadline is a shared dated event, so one asset serves fifty accounts. Every six weeks. |
| 3 · programmatic | ~1,300 accounts ~3,000 people | Meaney's feed (8,915 followers, 5.4× the company page), a LinkedIn newsletter — Duco runs one, Fund Recs doesn't — and the ten-question self-assessment. Weekly presence, no outreach. Let the regulator do the qualifying. |
Budget benchmark
B2B SaaS at $10m ARR growing ~50% spends 6–10% of ARR on marketing excluding sales salaries. ~$800,000/year. Against $2.0m new-logo ARR that's a CAC ratio of 0.4 and roughly five months' payback.
| Line | Annual | % | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Events & Adminovate | $240k | 30% | Where the market physically is. Adminovate is an owned asset they under-exploit; add 4–6 cluster roundtables |
| Content & proof | $160k | 20% | Self-assessment, honest comparison, 4 client stories, video transcription, the regulator series |
| ABM programme | $120k | 15% | Data, intent tooling, named-account pages. Tiers 1–2 only |
| Paid — LinkedIn + search | $120k | 15% | From zero. Against a 4,000-person universe this is generous; Duco runs 344 ads |
| Analyst & third-party proof | $80k | 10% | G2 presence, one analyst engagement, one commissioned ROI study. Currently zero, and it blocks procurement |
| Web, SEO, AI answers | $60k | 7.5% | Comparison pages, schema, the OEM attribution fix |
| Reserve | $20k | 2.5% | Competitive response — Gresham/Finologee is live |
Measure one thing: sixteen proof-of-concepts. Everything else is a leading indicator.