Posts Tagged ‘SME ERP’

Wellington leads NZ Growth Surge for Enprise

February 11, 2014

It was only May last year when Wellington’s economy looked so bleak that even our prime minister John Key referred to it as a “dying city”. “All you have there is government, Victoria University and Weta Workshop” he said.

From my perspective today at Enprise Solutions and the business of selling MYOB EXO business management software to a wide cross-section of medium-sized NZ businesses; Wellington’s small to medium business owners have switched on to investing for growth and I would say that they are more optimistic about the general business climate than we’ve ever seen before. The last quarter of 2013 saw Enprise sell more than three times as many MYOB EXO systems in Wellington as the same quarter the previous year. December and January were record months for new Wellington-based MYOB EXO ERP software sales, with February shaping up to look even better.

Enprise’s other New Zealand branches in Auckland and Hamilton are also experiencing an upsurge in demand now that confidence is returning to the New Zealand business climate. Businesses owners are realizing that they need to invest in putting strong operational and financial systems in place to compete and capitalize on the opportunities of a more buoyant market. There is also a strong shift towards Cloud Computing and almost half of all the MYOB EXO systems we sell are hosted in the Cloud by our associate company 2Cloud.biz.

In Australia, Enprise has offices in Sydney and Melbourne which also focus on selling MYOB EXO software to the larger local SME businesses. Australian business confidence took a hit last year before the election and we noticed a drop-off in business software investment. Following the election, we are seeing a recovery in business sentiment and we’re now very optimistic about Australian sales in 2014.

Posted in ERP, MYOB EXO, New Zealand IT Industry | Leave a Comment »
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Global SAP Business One Partners Praise Sydney Event

May 30, 2011

Sydney SAP Business One Solution Summit

Earlier this month, on the 19th & 20th May, I attended the Sydney SAP Business One Solution Summit, which was held at the Sheraton Four Points Hotel in Darling Harbour.

The event was attended by eleven Global SAP Business One Solution Partners (including Enprise Software) and thirteen SAP Business One Resellers from around Australia and New Zealand. The Solution Partners presented their vertical and horizontal solutions for SME businesses, all built to run on the SAP Business One platform. An additional event of a similar format was held in Singapore in the following week for SAP Business One Resellers in that region.

It was the first time that this many Global Solution Partners for SAP Business One had ever congregated at a single event on this scale within the Australasian region. As one of the organisers of the event, I was very pleased that we received so much positive feedback about its success.

“This was the first such event that I have ever attended and it was more than worthwhile! We are now working with new ssp’s, which is extremely exciting and would not have happened were it not for the conference.”

Simon Bishop, Inecom

“Both events exceeded my expectations in terms of opportunity and business development. I agree with everyone – we MUST do this again regularly.”

John Houltham, Batchmaster Software Inc.

“The format was good, the venue was great but most importantly the tone of the meetings were excellent. We were there together to foster a new level of partnership that would drive more opportunities for all involved parties.”

Ross Elliot, Accellos

“I also got very good feedback from my team and we got a lot opportunities. We would really like to join the next events.”

Manuel Grenacher, coresystems

“I participate at a lot of events in the last 7 years in EMEA and North America as an SSP, but these two were definitely the best.”

Peter Sauermann, Maringo

I would like to make special mention of Richard Duffy of SAP who was the driving force behind the Sydney event and made it all happen on the day.

We now look forward to the next event of this type.

Posted in Enprise Job Costing, ERP, Project Costing, SAP Business One, Sap Isv | Leave a Comment »
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SAP Business One ASUG Summit at Nike WHQ, Beaverton Oregon.

August 15, 2010

Last week I visited Nike’s World Headquarters in Beaverton, Oregon to attend the ASUG Business One Summit. This was probably one of the most positive and inspiring business events I’ve ever attended.

ASUG stands for “America’s SAP User Group” and it’s a group of SAP customers from throughout North America who network together to share their experiences and knowledge in order to get the most out of their SAP systems.

Nike is a leading member of ASUG and they very kindly donated the use of their impressive conference facilities for ASUG to hold this event. The Nike World Headquarters were as impressive as they were inspiring; this is what your business can do when it conquers the world! The Nike culture rules in this establishment; ties and cigarettes are forbidden from the campus – everyone’s an athlete in the Nike world.

From the SAP Business One perspective, this was a meeting of customers, resellers, solution partners and SAP. All are dedicated, committed and loyal to the Business One product, which is now used by over 30,000 small & medium sized businesses throughout the world.

In addition to the North American SAP Partners and customers, there were attendees from other countries around the world, including Denmark, Latin America, India, Switzerland, The Netherlands and New Zealand.

Among the Business One Solution Partners, was Enprise Software from New Zealand, demonstrating Enprise Job Costing for Business One. This is a successful solution, sold around the world, which enables Business One to be used by Service Companies, Project Based Companies and Make-to-Order manufacturers.

This year’s very successful ASUG Business One Summit would never have happened without the tireless commitment and dedication of Carl Lewis of Vision-33, who largely created and organised the event.

I look forward to next year’s ASUG Conference, which Carl tells me might either be at Coca Cola’s headquarters in Atlanta, or SAP’s American headquarters in Newtown Square, Philadelphia.

To match the quality of this year’s event will certainly be a “Nike Challenge”.

Posted in Enprise Job Costing, ERP, Project Costing, SAP Business One, Sap Isv | 2 Comments »
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SME’s Prefer Local Presence for ERP Sales & Service

April 11, 2010

Having clocked up more than 20 years of working in the ERP industry targeting small to medium enterprises (SMEs), I can now state confidently that there are some truths to this business that will probably never change.

Some of those truths are as follows…

  • Small and medium-sized businesses prefer to buy from and deal with local people, when it comes to ERP and accounting software. They want to eyeball and have face to face access with the people they are dealing with.
  • However, those businesses have no problem with using a centralized help desk function which is accessed by toll-free phone or the Internet – if it is offered in conjunction with localized representation.
  • SME focused resellers and service agents with only one geographic location therefore tend to be very generalist and opportunist about what type of solutions they sell and the customers they sell to. In other words they resist specialization because they only have a limited market of customers in their locality. This is obviously not the case for resellers that have wide regional coverage – as they have a larger accessible market and can afford to build up expertise in particular vertical markets.

For the above reasons, from the perspective of Enprise Software we are now seeing a consolidation of our SAP Business One ERP resellers that sell Enprise Job Costing, evident everywhere, but particularly in North America. The result is fewer reseller organisations, but with a much more spread-out branch structure and centralized customer support functions.

One of our best Enprise Job Costing partners that has been particularly successful in its geographic expansion with centralized support, is Vision-33 which now has regional offices in Irvine CA, Los Angeles CA, San Francisco CA, Salt Lake City UT, Seattle WA, Portland OR, Houston TX, Austin TX, Dallas TX, Fort Lauderdale FL and St Johns NL Canada.

Locally in New Zealand, Enprise New Zealand has been following the same strategy of building up a network of regional sales & implementation offices, with centralized support to claim the mantle of a “Nationwide” presence. Enprise NZ has offices & representation in Auckland, Waikato, Wellington and Christchurch (further regional expansion is planned for this year) . Centralized support is offered through toll-free 0800 numbers and Internet support web site.

I believe this is the best model for SME ERP sales and service. This is evidenced by the stellar sales success currently being enjoyed by both Vision-33 and Enprise New Zealand as they expand their presence in their respective markets. They can specialize in the types of solutions they offer to the market, building up specialized expertise, rather than needing to be all things to all people. It should also be said that specialized expertise and the quantities of scale achieved by these larger organizations leads to more successful outcomes for customers and greater profitability for the reseller…and that must be a good thing.

Posted in Enprise Job Costing, ERP, MYOB EXO, Project Costing, SAP Business One, Sap Isv | Leave a Comment »
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