V-Key is securing the digital world with a new software-based approach to mobile cybersecurity. The Singapore-based company has developed a virtual secure element - V-OS. It replaces vulnerable security methods, such as passwords, hardware tokens and SMS, with a smartphone-based software solution. 

“V-Key acts as a software smart chip that sits in your mobile apps,” explains Raymond Lee, COO at V-Key. “The physical chip on that plastic credit card in your pocket is traditionally what authenticates and authorises all your transactions. We’re replacing that with a virtual smart chip that belongs to you and sits within the apps you’ve downloaded.”

That promises to make cutting-edge mobile security accessible to anyone who has a smartphone. With a firm base in military, banking and government applications, the V-Key technology has been tried and tested under the most stringent circumstances. 

“This is globally certified hardcore security technology that had been implemented where security matters the most,” says Lee. 

The company has also made major in-roads into the mobile banking space and counts major banks among its client list. And with a new Digital Trust Platform that was just launched, V-Key is set to expand its offering across multiple industry verticals including logistics, IoT, smart infrastructure and gaming. 

This all adds up to significant growth since the company was launched in 2011. In the early years, Lee said he managed a small sales team with an Excel spreadsheet. But this became problematic as he scaled up the sales team to support the company’s rapid growth. 

“If I reflect back to when the sales team was three guys, I had my spreadsheet running and I knew everything,” he says. “But I knew that wouldn’t be as easy once the sales team had grown to 20.”

And with customer engagement timelines typically stretching from six to nine months, staying on top of complex customer relationships across the organisation was also looking more and more challenging. 

“In that engagement cycle we become quite close to people,” says Lee. “Then, when a customer goes to a new company we want them to wave the flag for us. That requires very strong customer relationships, and we need a high degree of granularity to achieve that.” 

The solution for Lee and the team at V-Key was Salesforce. 

“As sales professionals, we were very familiar with the power of Salesforce from previous roles,” he says. “At the same time, we had this need for integration. I manage marketing, pre-sales, customer support, professional services and the sales team, so I would have needed multiple spreadsheets. But with Salesforce it all comes down to a single source of truth.”

“We went on the JumpStart program for the Sales Cloud deployment, and we had a specialist from Salesforce help us through the set up,” explains Peter Mah, VP of Global Sales at V-Key. “It was a four-week program and we did not need external developers. It sounded very daunting for an SME like us, but with help from the JumpStart team it has been a smooth in-house implementation.” 

The integration was planned right at the very start. When Sales Cloud was deployed, the company also retired its legacy CRM and brought in Pardot, which is used to improve the marketing team’s ability to nurture and score leads. 

“We integrated our existing customer database into Pardot, and we love the lead nurturing aspect of the platform,” says Charlie Loke, Senior Marketing Manager at V-Key. “With Pardot we can nurture and score leads across all our different touchpoints. Our previous CRM didn’t allow that. And with Pardot, our database is over 90 per cent mailable.” 

“Employee onboarding has also been straightforward,” says Mah: “We typically bring in sales professionals who have prior experience with Salesforce, so onboarding is quite quick. And even if they don’t have prior experience with Salesforce, I take them through a 30-minute session myself and they’re ready to go. It’s very simple.”

Mah says Sales Cloud and Pardot are increasing transparency and driving collaboration across the company. 

“One of the most beneficial outcomes is that we are able to track opportunities through all the stages of our six-to-nine-month sales cycle. Typically, I use a Sales Cloud dashboard to run my weekly sales meeting. It gives us up-to-date numbers in real-time and that’s very important in a digital industry because we don’t need to wait for anyone.

“Sales Cloud also makes the pipeline visible to the entire company, not just the sales team. The board of directors and management team get absolute transparency. As a result, we have a very validated pipeline.”

Lee is equally impressed with the results. He says Sales Cloud has become an invaluable single source of truth for his fortnightly management meetings and quarterly board meetings. 

“Every one of those meetings starts with opportunity lists, and I need to have that information at my fingertips,” he says. “I specifically remember the quarter Peter and his team transitioned over to Sales Cloud. In the next board meeting I went from my Excel-generated slides to Sales Cloud dashboard snapshots, and it was a jaw-dropping experience. We were able to show that a lead was generated, that we followed it up, and won the business within a certain timeframe.

“We’ve doubled the sales team and at the same time I have more than double the granularity of insights into the deals. To me that is an amazing feat.”