Gary Barker, a widely respected figure in the property industry, has been appointed CEO of Launch B, a new prop-tech venture due to launch later this year.
Barker, 43, is leaving his position as CEO of The Reapit Group, a property software provider of CRM and property management solutions, to take up the new post.
He has been a member of the management team for 13 years, growing the business into a market-leading platform. Barker remains a supportive shareholder in Reapit.
The Reapit board has named industry veteran and non-executive board member Adrian Gill to oversee the company’s day-to-day operations, effective immediately.
Gill has spent the last twenty years in property services with 10 years at Connells Estate Agents before becoming CEO of LSL plc’s estate agencies.
After leaving LSL, he became Group CEO at Leaders Romans, a private equity-owned 150-branch estate agency. Gill has served on Reapit’s board of directors since 2019.
Barker has more than two decades experience in the property industry, having previously served in senior finance and IT roles at Countrywide.
He is a member of NAEA Propertymark, a non-executive board member of epropservices and a board member of Agents Giving.
It is understood that Reapit staff are being told of the changes this morning.
Gary Barker said:
“I am delighted that I will be joining a very exciting new business, which will bring huge benefits and rewards to agents, and a much more engaging experience for them and consumers than anything that has ever been available before.
“We will be opening up the market more widely and giving everyone access to technology that makes interesting things happen and should bring the market alive.
“Launch B have attracted world class talent and done a fantastic job of creating and building a unique business, a compelling model and an impressive brand building marketing strategy.
I have always been passionate about supporting our industry and I’ve been privileged to lead Reapit through a period of high growth and innovation.
“The time has come for me to take on the exciting challenge of a disruptive new venture, working alongside a formidable team with a genuinely compelling offer.
“I am looking forward to sharing our vision, and more details of the new brand, in due course”.
Michael Bruce, Executive Chairman of Launch B, said:
“I am delighted to welcome Gary to the business and thrilled that he will be overseeing its launch.
“He has a fantastic track record in the industry and is greatly admired for the work he has done at The Reapit Group, providing solutions to help agents advance and grow their business.
“Our mission will help agents to determine and shape the future and put them at the forefront of innovation whilst materially advancing the experience for everyone looking to buy, sell or let property.
“I welcome a great leader and an enormous talent”.
The company website says that:
LaunchB is an extremely well placed and fully funded start-up from a Founder of Purplebricks, the fastest growing and most disruptive PropTech start up in UK history (having reached a market cap in excess of £1.2bn within 4 years and revenues of over £100m); bringing together a formidable team of Engineers.
Utilising cutting-edge technologies, Machine Learning and data science to build a new, disruptive and innovative product offering with a highly engaging advertising campaign / marketing strategy to grow and develop the brand. We have a heavy focus on leveraging data and feedback loops to inform and support decision making, taking an iterative approach; designing, building and trialling concepts to test assumptions and provide validated learning.
We are building a team of motivated Engineers who share a growth mindset and an eagerness to learn, operating in a Lean-Agile environment and apply DevOps philosophies and practices, with a fail-fast, learn-fast mentality.
Comments (21)
Why not just say – “We are making a new CRM” and get it out there?
Why else would they want Gary on board?
Disruptive?
…….I switched off right there
at …….dis…Feckin…….ruptive
I’ll go and get my Skateboard now as that sits in the cupboard, right next to the word ……dis…Feckin……..ruptive
Think John McEnroe
Think Square Maltesers
Think rain falling upwards
Think GOD backwards is DOG? …….does that mean every 4-legged friend is really G*D.
Launch B ……ullsh!t
“The time has come for me to take on the exciting challenge of a disruptive new venture, working alongside a formidable team with a genuinely compelling offer.
……… most disruptive PropTech …..
………. to build a new, disruptive ……
Blimey that’s a lot of disruptive for a new venture that says it wants to help mentoring agents and I think says it all in their own words what they are really up to.
Their goal is to destroy the high street service. Bruce may it clear years ago that was his intention with PB and failed, so is this his new game of wolf in sheep’s clothing? Not a mention of “positive” use or needs to be a mentoring organistaion that will help agents.
What a silly comment. Their goal isn’t to destroy the high street, it’s to make money. You can’t really knock a business person for that.
If you don’t like their product when it’s released, don’t buy it. Simple.
I won’t deal with them, end of, PB were and are garbage, well done take your millions and p1$$ off, it’s like a divorce you don’t get to stay friends. And like a divorce I’d rather be poor and happy than comfortable and miserable, by all means use tech for advertising and communication, streamlining, but don’t tell lies, structured gaming of equally vile ” review ” sites, treat your staff as if they’re meat for the grinder, and burden your competitors with doing your job post sale because hey, you know. Chains are linked.
I have never read a press release with so much marketing bull**** terminology in my life.
AND THERE WE HAVE IT.
It took an even shorter amount of time than I imagined, following the unveiling of the all new charitable Bruces, for them to set up something to flog to those whose welfare they are so concerned about…they are all heart.
In fairness, TPAR, I believe this was set up before the other. Frau Renshaw reported on it back in February here:
propertyindustryeye.com/is-this-what-a-founder-of-purplebricks-is-getting-up-to-now-clue-it-aims-to-be-disruptive/
I doubt that means one was not conceived without the other.
Neither do I – but the sugared coating is added to the bitter pill to make more swallow it – not the other way round.
I used Fleapit when I was at a High St Corporate.
Clunky, Cumbersome and not particularly user friendly. I admit that was nearly 7 years ago and since I set up un my own I haven’t needed anything that heavy.
Here we go with the ‘cutting edge’ and the ‘disruptive’. Please STOP – it’s SO 2015.
The only time ‘Disruptive’ gets my attention now is when I’m discussing the attributes of a Romulan weapons system. Which is, well, never…
Clunky, cumbersome and not particularly user friendly, you referring to Mr Barker or the software?
like pets they tend to resemble their owners
Why does a fancy new start up needs a dinosaur?
Reapit doesn’t even have a cloud based version of it’s software for desktop. Yep that’s right, you can use a cloud based native app for Andriod and iOS but not for desktop (I appreciate it’s in the works). God knows why LanuchB want to poach people like this guy from a company that’s about 6 years behind where it should be.
I know, let’s employ a bunch of dinosaurs, over pay them and let them minimise the rate in which we can innovate.
I also have a feeling LaunchB is going to be another Homesearch (granted I really like Homesearch). However on LaunchB’s careers page they’re still trying to recruit developers to build the platform so we wont see this “ground breaking” tech out of beta for at least 1 year minimum. Probably 2 if they keep employing dinosaurs.
Sooooooo, what do they do?
Portal/CRM or combined is my guess. The clue is in ‘We have a heavy focus on leveraging data‘.
LaunchB ….so Bricks must have been LaunchA.
But they are taking an interative approach so it will sorted by LaunchF…
Quote from their website :-
“Our market is valued in excess of £8b, and we have ambitious plans to build a market leading product and business.”
So whats £8bn?
The total value of the UK portal sector.
Makes sense now the ‘Well being & Mentoring’ – PR to try and make us forget what sh**s they are so they can flog us all CRM systems etc.
I will NEVER knowingly sign up for a product / service which has these guys involved.
Hopefully his first task will be to rewrite the website so people can actually understand what Launch B do.
Been on about a dozen times and still none the wiser…….
Exactly! First rule of sales cut the jargon and the crap. Lean-agile dev-ops and fail-fast exactly what I’m looking for to grow my business if I had any clue what they were……
Hahaha…….
Having read the website it sounds like they do all the marketing for *Visit Birmingham* or something with all the twaddle about how many bars and restaurants there are in the city centre? That was my first thought.