Patience Pays For Propylon
Good things come to those who have patience and perseverance. For the principals of Propylon Holdings, the journey to a rewarding exit took over two decades. In July 2023, the business was acquired by AIM-listed RWS Holdings plc for €30.1m, with additional contingent payments of €6.4m.
The company has positioned itself at the intersection between rule-makers and rule-takers, providing content creation, management and publishing services for legal and legislative content. Its user-friendly solution allows authoring in its CMS through Microsoft Word.
The business was founded by
Paul McKeon, Declan Hogan and Sean McGrath in 1999, with an official launch two years later. McKeon and Hogan were partners in an accountancy practice, and the original concept revolved around using technology to respond to accountancy needs before morphing into the legislative arena.
Among the first clients was the Oireachtas, where Propylon developed an electronic publishing solution for parliamentary drafting, building what the company claimed to be the largest repository of XML/HTML in the world at the time. With a blue-chip client on its books, the company’s Legislative Workbench helped Propylon win business in the Pennsylvania state legislature.
That deal was worth $6m to the young company, which had 60 staff in Ireland and the US in 2006, and led the firm to forecast sales of $10m that year in what was estimated to be a market worth between $500m and $1bn.
The lift-off did not materialise as rapidly as anticipated, but with turnover of €10.5m and Ebitda of c.€3.5m in FY22, the founders and its management team of CEO John Harrington and COO Dan Murphy have built a thriving business. On acquiring the company, RWS said Propylon’s turnover was on track to increase turnover by 30% in 2023, and that the business had c.100 employees in Ireland and the US.
Prior to the sale, Propylon had four individual shareholders and four company shareholders. Filings suggest that McKeon family members spoke for 32.4% of the equity, while John and Carmel Harrington owned 29.3%, Dan and Pauline Murphy had a combined 15.3% stake, and a nominee company owned 14.6%. Sean McGrath’s shareholding was 7.4%, according to filings, with Patricia Conlon on 1%.
In 2021, the company paid a dividend of €8.5m to shareholders, after the company delivered an aftertax profit of €4.4m. In a Q&A on the Propylon website, John Harrington was asked about the best advice he ever received. “Don’t be afraid of partnerships,” he advised. “When it comes to our products and projects, we always adopt a partnership approach. This is the best way to get successful solutions and enjoy yourself while you are doing it.”
Harrington also referenced his first job as a newspaper delivery boy. “It taught me that doing the simple things right made customers happy,” he recalled. “Too often in the technical world we are focused on solving big problems and can forget the small things that make people happy on a daily basis.”
The quality the Propylon boss most admires is optimism. “I think it can be hard to stay optimistic every day dealing with the realities of life, but it is so important to bring hope and optimism into people’s lives,” he told his colleagues.