Signpost: a laptop for every Flemish student

Signpost was founded with the intention of offering legal software at a heavily discounted price to students. Meanwhile, the company has further diversified into the education niche. The sale and rental of hardware and software to educational institutions (and directly to
pupils and students) are still the core business. Since 2015, the company has also offered a streaming platform for 800 academic
software titles, with cloud solutions and training for partner schools. And since 2018 – following an acquisition – there has been an interactive learning platform.

Democratising digitisation

Signpost focuses exclusively on the education sector. Just about all colleges, most universities and the majority of Flemish secondary schools are customers. The company aims to relieve educational institutions of as many IT worries as possible. To this end, it offers its own service desk, replacement and repair service. This makes Signpost the largest repair service for HP and Lenovo devices in our country. With the roll-out of ‘bring your own device’ projects in education, there is certainly still room for growth. CEO Arne Vandendriessche: “The new attainment targets on digital competences and media literacy require more intensive ICT operation and many schools see benefit in a laptop for every pupil.”

Subordinated loan

Wanting to continue its strong expansion, Signpost sought additional funding to strengthen its balance sheet. That balance sheet strengthening came via a subordinated loan from PMV. “We are aiming for a turnover of 40 million in 2020. This rapid growth also means cash flow issues and financing challenges. In order to boost our equity, we tapped PMV to make it easier to refuel at the bank,” says Arne Vandendriessche.