Innovation is key to growth. AFD Software has grown to become the world’s leading specialist on UK addressing by understanding the pains our customers face and developing solutions to solve them.
Our highly experienced team has over 450 years of combined experience helping organisations get data right. Although some of our team were not born when PN1 was delivered in 1995, [Ed, eek!], many of the younger professionals in our business have spent their whole working lives with us, attracted by our good working conditions and kept engaged by our innovation, thus becoming experts in their own right.
We have highlighted some of the key AFD developments over the years, demonstrating our history of innovation.
1988
“AFD MailSaver” launched, helping organisations make major savings sorting mailing data.
1994
“AFD Postcode” launched, making rapid address entry affordable to all.
1995
“AFD Postcode Plus” brought lightning-fast property-level validation.
1996
“AFD Postcode Provider” automated the addition of missing postcodes to databases.
1997
“AFD ZipAddress” Zipcode software launched for USA addressing.
Ahead of the crowd, AFD Software anticipated the impending business opportunities that the internet and online shopping would bring. “AFD Postcode Internet” was launched, allowing – for the first time – websites accepting orders and capturing customer details to validate the address provided, making orders easier to complete for the customer, and delivery more accurate and reliable.
1999
International address formatting tool “AFD Address 2000” launched.
2000
Postcoding via WAP (an early mobile internet platform) launched.
2001
Validation of bank, account and sort codes became available with “AFD BankFinder”. “AFD TraceMaster” allowed organisations to trace individuals with current and historic name, address and phone data.
2002
Platform independence was achieved through XML server-based solutions.
2003
“AFD Refiner” brought Automatic Address Cleansing, Postcode Addition, Data Appending and DeDuplication.
2004
“AFD Censation” launched, a powerful geodemographic classification system providing the relative affluence, life-stage and lifestyle at postcode level.
2005
Electronic Distribution Centre opened to speed up delivery and installation of quarterly data updates.
2006
Single API access was enabled to all AFD name, address & bank solutions.
2007
DX (Document eXchange) Integration allowed DX addresses to be automatically identified from a PAF address and vice versa. DX enables secure and swift distribution of documents between its members.
2008
“AFD World Address” was launched, containing the best available data sources for 240 nations in a single solution, allowing organisations that trade globally to do so with address accuracy.
2009
Premium Deceased identification service became available.
2010
Release of “Channel Spectrum”, a Channel Preference Scoring System which allowed you to confidently decide which communication channel to use when communicating with customers and prospects.
2011
“Postcode Evolution” – an integrated service delivery platform was launched. The web server, application server, data layer, data update and program update mechanism is delivered in a single package. Postcode Evolution provides access to current and future AFD products and services. It is flexible, reliable and scalable and is designed to allow clients to seamlessly transfer between hosted and installed operation.
2012
“AFD Postcode Plus” and “AFD BankFinder” for iOS delivered address and bank validation on iPhone and iPad.
2013
Android and Salesforce CRM integrations were made available.
2014
Healthcheck service launched providing a free audit of the quality of address data in a contact database.
2015
New group HQ – at Mountain View Innovation Centre, “MVIC”. Due to sustained growth for the AFD Group we sought and developed a new Head Office location. MVIC is at the heart of key Internet highways allowing continued connectivity of our services. The site has delivered spacious office accommodation, recreational and social facilities – and like the organisation, our physical HQ continues to develop and demonstrate innovation in all its facets, while maximising and using green energy sources wherever possible.
2016
Eircode validation – provides property level address validation for all 2.2 million addresses in Ireland. ”AFD Robot” provided developer-free integration of name, address and bank validation into any application with just two lines of code.
2017
Installed mobile products allowed name, address and bank validation to be completed on a mobile device with or without a mobile internet connection.
Live email validation introduced; three checks validate syntax, domain and local part.
2018
Performance Evolution, Typeahead and Fast Find brought improvements to the speed and accuracy of our validation solutions.
Telephone validation checks whether the number entered is “live”.
The largest solar array on the Isle of Man was installed on one of the roofs at MVIC. Since then AFD has been utilising the power of the sun to generate the electricity used on-site, saving over 52 Tonnes in CO2 emissions – the equivalent of planting 1570 trees.
2019
Data Suppression Service introduced, which flags contacts that have deceased or no longer live at the address held. If a forwarding address is available it is supplied.
2020
Geo locate and coding solutions developed for pin-point property level data lookup and appending.
We serve thousands of organisations and a network of hundreds of partners across multiple industry sectors, enabling them to have full confidence in their contact data.