Evolution Capital Partners invests in new platform
Evolution Capital Partners is pleased to announce its control investment in DataFit, LLC, the nation’s leader in data-driven muscular strength assessments for employers. Organizational healthcare costs are second only to labor costs and are rising at a rate that is multiples higher than inflation. As these costs continue to skyrocket, DataFit partners with employers to reduce healthcare costs and create safer, healthier workplaces. Since 1998, the Hudson, Ohio-based company has performed over 600,000 assessments nationwide providing clients an overall return on their investment of over $5 in reduced healthcare costs for every $1 spent. DataFit offers New Hire Assessments, Well-Being Assessments, Return-to-Work Assessments and Job Task Analyses. The combination of these services reduces costs by identifying those individuals more likely to experience a workplace injury through objective data collection, also improving productivity, minimizing absenteeism, reducing pharmacy spend and improving employee morale.
DataFit re-branding and re-naming project led by Evolution
Evolution’s original investment was made when the company was branded Industrial Physical Capability Services, Inc. or IPCS. The messaging to customers and prospects was focused on muscle strength and the company’s services were primarily sold through speaking engagements at orthopedic conferences. IPCS’s historical financial performance was unpredictable as the result of the fluctuating testing requirements for a concentrated base of customers. The online content was focused primarily on the aging founder’s historical success and expertise in the science of muscle health. At the time the transaction closed, the company had not secured a new customer for several years.
As part of this process, the Evolution team has now focused the newly-branded DataFit’s messaging around three critical themes. First, we now emphasize the company’s history of reducing clients’ overall healthcare costs by at least $5 for every $1 spent. Given this high return on investment, we have been able to change the dynamic of the sales process away from price. This is important, given that competitors offer less objective Functional Capacity Tests, visual assessments at a lower price point.
Second, the new messaging reinforces that the employer is in control and that DataFit simply administers the assessments at the direction of the employer. Historically, too many employers either adopted or fully rejected the DataFit offering. This would often create a dynamic in which client human resources and legal counsel were concerned about becoming too selective and not filling positions or about exposing the employer to EEO claims. By suggesting a sliding scale of options available to employers, allowing them to adjust the assessment metrics, DataFit provides an opportunity for internal compromise. Customer organizations can eliminate only the most extreme strength mismatches, therefore reducing costs but also filling all or most of the open positions. In the current labor environment, employers are often willing to accept a smaller reduction in healthcare cost to ensure positions are filled.
Finally, DataFit’s new messaging argues that the company has a moral obligation to not place a prospective employee in a job where there is a high likelihood of injury. Too often there is a fear by the employer of being sued by the candidate based on EEO claims, but the employers are intimately aware of the physical demands of the job and should not subject individuals to situations in which probability of injury is higher than it needs to be.
The recent name change from Industrial Physical Capability Services to DataFit aims to make the name easier and more memorable and also emphasizes that the company’s offering is based on objective data and not subjective visual assessments. It also refers to the company’s database, which is the largest in the nation of prospective employee strength assessment results. In the case of DataFit’s well being program, the database helps determine whether an existing employee deserves a better rate on health insurance. The “Fit” part of the name refers to the company’s foundation in muscle strength and health. The benefits of being “fit” are not limited to physical benefits such as resistance to certain types of diseases and decreased absenteeism but also include the mental and emotional well being that affect a person’s productivity, happiness, resilience, etc.
In addition to the company name and messaging changes, the company logo and website have been transformed from a dated design and color scheme to a more modern, forward-looking design with crisper, more focused messaging. We believe this project is another example of how Evolution adds tremendous value to its investments in an economical way, with high impact and great return-on-energy.
Evolution is unique in how it adds value
Evolution is a hands-on operations-oriented investor, with our team members acting as an extension of company leadership, working tactically, shoulder-to-shoulder to level-up and professionalize an organization. Evolution is eventually able to transform to a more strategic role focused on new product and service offerings, geographic expansion, acquisitions, investment allocation, governance and talent management as the company evolves. Evolution Capital’s core value of “Return on Energy” is critical in these situations in which we are able to initially invest at a reasonable valuation, then improve a company by expending our team’s energy, creativity and expertise, making the organization appealing to the next echelon of buyer.
