Mazuma, the UK’s leading online accountancy firm for small and micro-businesses, has announced that Gary Turner has joined its Board of directors. Turner was the UK CEO and Co-Founder of accounting giant Xero before leaving the company in 2022 after 12 years.
Founded in 2006 by Lucy Cohen and Sophie Hughes in South Wales, Mazuma launched a subscription model for accountancy services. It has grown to have over 10,000 subscribers across the UK. The firm has built a strategic relationship with FreshBooks.
The announcement comes after Innovation Investment Capital (IIC) made a multi-million-pound investment into Mazuma in January 2024. At the same time as the investment, Lucy Cohen was appointed as CEO. As the firm looked to expand its disruptive business model for the micro-business accountancy space.
Mazuma offers a range of accountancy packages that are available through its subscription services and overlaid with the MazApp platform. This dedicated secure web portal enables clients to send documents for processing and raise invoices.
Lucy Cohen, Co-Founder and CEO of Mazuma, commented, “What excites me most about having Gary join our Board is our alignment in vision and purpose. His motivations at Xero were the same as ours at Mazuma. We are all about reducing the accounting burden for our customers so that they can focus on running their businesses. Gary has been on the growth journey that we are taking, and I’m thrilled that he has elected to bring his skills and experiences to Mazuma in support of our growth plans.
“A business with the ambitions we have, needs a team of incredible people to execute the vision. With Gary as an NED on our Board and our recent executive appointments of Emma Crawford-Falekaono as CRO and David Morris as CPTO, we have a team that can really help us accelerate our growth and further develop our client service offering. I cannot wait to see what we do next.”
Who is Gary Turner
Since leaving Xero, Turner has invested in and become a non-executive director of several firms, including Translucent. Earlier this year, he was also appointed a venture partner at Anamcara. A venture capital firm specialising in pre-seed stage funding focused on European B2B firms. He has joined the firm as an advisor following his departure from Xero.
Turner brings a wealth of experience from driving the growth in the UK as well as his time at both Microsoft of Pegasus Software. There he was Managing Director for four years. At Xero, he built the UK user base substantially during his tenure. Xero now has over 4 million business subscribers.
Turner commented, “I’m delighted to be joining an organisation whose values so clearly align with mine. The UK’s 6 million small and micro-businesses form the backbone of our economy. Yet many struggle to access the support and guidance they need to grow and prosper. I’ve long admired Mazuma’s focus here, and I am excited to be working with Lucy, my fellow board members and the executive team to help Mazuma play an even greater part in serving the needs of this vital sector of our economy.”
Enterprise Times: What does this mean
Mazuma is becoming a significant player in the accountancy services market. It is providing a new option for more traditional bookkeeping and accountancy services. It combines self-service technology with automation and the financial expertise that MSMEs have traditionally sought traditional accountants to provide.
Mazuma can now draw on the expertise of Turner to help strategies on how it might grow faster across the UK. Turner built the Xero organisation from nothing. He will be able to help steer Mazuma to further growth, offering perspectives that will be invaluable to the firm.
