What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Patrick Rowbotham, chief executive of Cawthorne Learning, heard the Growth proposal at £62k including implementation. He decided nothing, will take it to the board, and is cautiously positive. Decision date 18 Nov 2026 holds.
What happened: Harvey Doyle walked Patrick and Cerys Llewellyn through the Growth proposal. Patrick asked about cost per customer, day-to-day use, data location and the exit.
Customer view: Patrick linked the need to funding rule changes and wanting to see who is wobbling earlier. He liked the idea of agreeing up front what good looks like.
Commercial: The £62k covers implementation as well as subscription, so it is not an annual figure alone. Patrick will not decide without the board and the cost laid out per provider.
Watch: Cerys named connecting helpdesk and usage data cleanly as the risk. Harvey committed to an annual term with a first-review measure.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Who was there
BG-Demo
Them
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Harvey Doyle sends the written proposal with the implementation and subscription split.
- Cerys Llewellyn sends the number of providers so Harvey can show cost per provider.
- Hannah Lowe writes up the security and data answers.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Decision rests with the board and may slip by days.
- Connecting helpdesk and usage data cleanly is the delivery risk Cerys named.
- Patrick asked about exit terms and the commitment is an annual subscription.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Growth tier sale of £62,000 including implementation, with a per-provider cost case for the board.
Transcript
- Harvey DoyleAfternoon, both. Patrick, good to meet you properly. Cerys has told me a lot.
- Patrick RowbothamAfternoon, Harvey, and likewise. Cerys, would you set the scene for me? I'd like to be sure I'm hearing the same story.
- Cerys LlewellynOf course. My team asked me this week, again, why they can't see tickets, usage and renewals for each provider in one place. They do it by hand, it takes Abigail and the others a good chunk of Monday, and we only spot a provider at risk once it's already half out the door. We saw a demo earlier this month and I think it answers that, and I've seen this work before.
- Patrick RowbothamThank you. And the funding rule changes are the reason this matters now, as I understand it. If providers' budgets tighten, we need to see who's wobbling earlier.
- Cerys LlewellynYes. Retention is the whole point. Nothing fancier than that.
- Harvey DoyleThat's a good framing, and I'll keep to it. So what I'd like to do is walk through the proposal in plain terms, and then you can ask whatever you like. Is that alright?
- Patrick RowbothamPlease do.
- Harvey DoyleSo the proposal is for the Growth tier. That's the one for several teams, and it includes the dashboards builder and a quarterly review with your customer success manager on our side. The deal value is £62,000 in total, and that includes the one-off implementation work, so it isn't an annual subscription figure on its own. I'll send you the breakdown in writing so you can see the split.
- Patrick RowbothamRight. Thank you for being clear about that, it's easy to read a number like that wrongly. What's the cost per customer, if I put it in terms the board will use?
- Harvey DoyleFair. It depends how you count, so rather than guess, Cerys can tell me how many providers you'd count, and I'll put it per provider in the follow-up. That way the board sees a figure that's yours, not mine.
- Cerys LlewellynI'll get you that this week, Harvey. I'd rather it's right.
- Patrick RowbothamGood. And how will the team use it, day to day? I don't want to buy something that sits there.
- Cerys LlewellynLet's start with the team who'll use it. Abigail's team open it on Monday for the list of providers at the edge, and the renewals view replaces the sheet. If it's not in use within a few weeks, we'd know, because usage would show it.
- Harvey DoyleAnd that's something we'd review with you. That's what the quarterly check-ins are for, looking at whether people are actually asking questions of it.
- Patrick RowbothamMm. And the data. Our providers' information is sensitive, learners and so on. Where does it live?
- Harvey DoyleIn your own Snowflake account. We build and run it there, so it's not copied off into ours. For the detail of the controls I'd rather have our solutions engineer, Hannah, answer you in writing than me improvise, because I'd hate to overstate anything.
- Patrick RowbothamI'd appreciate that. That's the sort of thing I'd have to show the board.
- Cerys LlewellynPatrick, shall I say where I think the risk is? Not on the product, on us. Getting the helpdesk and usage data connected cleanly. That's where I'd want help.
- Harvey DoyleWhich is why the implementation is in the proposal and why Hannah would plan the order of connection with you, so the helpdesk comes first and your team sees value early.
- Patrick RowbothamLet me ask something slightly awkward. If we sign and it doesn't help, what then? What's the exit?
- Harvey DoyleIt's an annual subscription under our standard agreement, so you'd be committed to the year. What I'd say is that we'd rather agree up front what good looks like, say, the questions being asked, the list of providers at risk being used, and measure it at the first review. I'd write that into the proposal as the plan.
- Patrick RowbothamI like that. It's more honest than most. Well, I won't decide anything today, you'll appreciate. It needs to go to the board with the cost laid out.
- Harvey DoyleCompletely understood, and I wouldn't ask you to. We've been working towards Wednesday 18 November 2026 as a decision date. Does that still work with when your board sits?
- Patrick RowbothamI think so. Cerys, you know the board calendar better than I do. Let Cerys lead on this, Harvey, and she'll tell you if it moves.
- Cerys LlewellynIt works. If it slips it'll be by days, not weeks, and I'll tell you straight away.
- Harvey DoyleGreat. So to recap. I send the written proposal with the split between implementation and subscription. Cerys sends me the number of providers so I can show it per provider. Hannah writes up the security and data answers. Then you take it to the board, and we speak again before the date.
- Patrick RowbothamThat sounds right. Thank you both. I'm cautiously positive, I'll say that.
- Cerys LlewellynDiolch, both. Speak soon.
- Harvey DoyleThanks, Patrick, thanks, Cerys. Speak soon. Bye.