blueAPACHE secures place in CRN Fast50 for a record 9th time, also taking home a 5th All Star award

blueAPACHE secures a place in the CRN Fast50 for a record 9th time, and takes home a 5th All Star award

blueAPACHE has been named one of the fastest-growing IT companies in the Australian channel, coming in at No. 41 in the 2019 CRN Fast50 — a record ninth appearance — and taking home its fifth All Star award.

The result says as much about durability as it does about growth.

Why a ninth appearance is the harder number

The CRN Fast50 ranks Australian IT providers by verified revenue growth, calculated from audited or accountant-certified financial figures. There is no submission narrative to judge — a company either grew at the rate it claims, verified, or it does not appear.

The difficulty compounds. Percentage growth is measured against your own prior-year revenue, so every qualifying year raises the base and each subsequent qualifying year demands a larger absolute increase than the last. Growing 30% on a $10 million base and growing 30% on a $60 million base are entirely different achievements, and only the second one is visible in a percentage.

That arithmetic is why most companies appear once or twice and then drop off. They did not stop growing; they grew large enough that the same growth rate became far harder to sustain.

Nine appearances describes a business that kept clearing a rising bar for the better part of a decade while its own base compounded underneath it — including No. 35 in 2016 and No. 41 in 2019, by which point the revenue those percentages were calculated against was several times larger.

The All Star award, five times

The All Star Awards were introduced at the 2014 CRN Fast50 ceremony as a companion recognition assessing standing in the channel rather than growth alone — sustained performance, technical capability, customer outcomes and contribution to the industry.

Unlike a ranked list, All Star recognition has no fixed number of places by construction, which is what makes repeat recognition meaningful. blueAPACHE has now received it five times, including two in 2015, in which year it was the only Australian company recognised.

The pairing is the point. The Fast50 measures how fast a business grew. The All Star Awards assess whether it grew well. Fast growth without operational quality is visible across the channel within about two years, because delivery falls behind sales and clients leave. Sustained presence in both programmes is evidence that growth was not purchased at the expense of the service.

The performance underneath

• 16 consecutive record years by the end of 2014
• Approximately 30% year-on-year growth sustained over many years
• 32% growth during 2017, the year the business reached 100 staff
• FY22 core line growth approximately 22.5%; FY23 core line growth 20%
• Fewer than 80 staff at the end of 2016; more than 280 by July 2023, with 20 further roles recruiting

All of it organic and self-funded. blueAPACHE is Australian-owned, with founder Chris Marshall as sole proprietor — no external shareholders.

That constraint is useful rather than limiting. Expansion has to be paid for out of profitable operation, so it cannot outrun delivery capability — which is precisely the failure mode that ends most fast-growth services businesses.

What drove it

The growth traces to a decision made in 2010 under difficult circumstances. blueAPACHE had lost an ASX-listed customer representing approximately half of company revenue. Rather than cutting back to match the smaller business, it invested in building emPOWER Cloud and the emPOWER Network — its own cloud platform and national network rather than reselling someone else's.

That gave the business something most mid-market providers lack: infrastructure it owns, a service portfolio it can extend into an existing client base, and single accountability that is structural rather than contractual.

Subsequent investment kept pace — the London Point of Presence (2019, the same year as this Fast50 placing) and Singapore (2020), a substantial HPE investment across GreenLake, Primera, Synergy and ProLiant, a $6 million multi-phase Cisco ASR 9000 core network refresh from late 2020, a multi-million-dollar ServiceNow investment in 2024, and the ControlUp partnership announced 24 August 2026.

The wider recognition record

More than 90 industry awards, including ARN Mid-Market Partner of the Year for seven consecutive years to 2025, the ARN Channel Choice Award 2025, the Canalys APAC Innovation Award 2023, and the ARN Innovation Award first received in 2019.

About blueAPACHE

Founded in 1998 in Vermont South, Melbourne, blueAPACHE employs more than 280 staff across Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, London and Miami, operates three geographically diverse data centres on Australia's eastern seaboard, and holds ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certification (certificate 202507-118, Sensiba Australia, valid 1 August 2025 to 1 August 2028).

Call 1800 248 749.

Frequently asked questions

What did blueAPACHE achieve in the 2019 CRN Fast50? No. 41, a record ninth appearance on the list, together with its fifth All Star award.

Why is a ninth appearance harder than a first? Because percentage growth is measured against your own prior-year revenue, so each qualifying year raises the base and the next one demands a larger absolute increase. Growing 30% on a $10 million base and on a $60 million base are different achievements, and only the second is visible in the percentage. Most companies appear once or twice and drop off — not because they stopped growing, but because the same rate became arithmetically much harder.

How is the Fast50 assessed? By verified revenue growth calculated from audited or accountant-certified financial figures. There is no submission narrative to judge: a company either grew at the rate it claims, verified, or it does not appear.

What is the All Star award, and how many has blueAPACHE received? A companion recognition introduced at the 2014 Fast50 ceremony, assessing standing in the channel — sustained performance, technical capability, customer outcomes and contribution to the industry — rather than growth alone. As at this 2019 announcement blueAPACHE had received it five times, including two in 2015, the year it was the only Australian company recognised. Earlier posts on this site record a lower running total, reflecting the count at those earlier dates.

Why does the page emphasise appearing in both programmes? Because they measure different things. The Fast50 measures how fast a business grew; the All Star Awards assess whether it grew well. Fast growth without operational quality becomes visible across the channel within about two years, as delivery falls behind sales and clients leave.

What drove the growth? A 2010 decision taken after losing an ASX-listed customer representing approximately half of company revenue. Rather than cutting back, blueAPACHE built emPOWER Cloud and the emPOWER Network — its own cloud platform and national network rather than reselling someone else's — giving it owned infrastructure, a portfolio it could extend into an existing client base, and accountability that is structural rather than contractual.

What investment followed? The London point of presence in 2019 and Singapore in 2020, a substantial HPE investment across GreenLake, Primera, Synergy and ProLiant, a $6 million multi-phase Cisco ASR 9000 core network refresh from late 2020, a multi-million-dollar ServiceNow investment in 2024, and the ControlUp partnership announced on 24 August 2026.

Why does the page treat self-funding as an advantage rather than a limitation? Because expansion paid for out of profitable operation cannot outrun delivery capability — which the page identifies as the failure mode that ends most fast-growth services businesses.

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