The big news this week is the proposed acquisition of QAD by Thoma Bravo for US$2 billion. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2021. It wasn’t the only acquisition last week; Appfire acquired SoftwarePlant and SalesLoft bought instereo. Unit 4 set up Thesis under the ownership of Advent for its Student Information management division.
Several research reports were published, notably by Mavenlink, iCIMS and Cleo. There are more below, including a significant study by IFS.
Enterprise Times published an interview with the CEO of startup Lance Bank. There is also a podcast with Dent Wizard, whose selection of Rootstock ERP a decade ago was not the end of their transformation. In recent years they have continued to transform the business, taking advantage of the improvements in the Cloud ERP software.
Finally, the Tech Trailblazers awards launched for its tenth year. The independent awards seek to highlight the best startups across several sectors.
Pick of the week
IFS has published a study based on a survey of 1,700+ executives and 12,000+ consumers. It found that despite investments in customer experience metrics such as NPS, 82% could not recall a single positive example of a recent frictionless customer experience. It is entitled “Fixing the Fundamentals”. At 12 pages In length, it strikes a balance between insights from the survey and analysis. With such as large sample, the study is well worth a read and provides four takeaways for executives to ponder in its conclusion.
The study’s premise presumes that firms need to deliver “Moments of Service” to drive success. The IFS strapline is well-founded in a world where companies or becoming servitised. However, the study shows that despite 90% are in the process of changing. Darren Roos, CEO IFS commented: “Business models focused on products are no longer fit for the digital economy. Instead, organizations need to shift to selling outcomes and services.”
However, the study finds that while companies invest in transformation programs, there are often gaps with the approach that could lead to failure. While many firms are transforming, a large minority are failing to do so in a holistic way. Where challenges arise, only 14% proactively plan to prevent problems across customer inflection points. When 26% of customers cease engaging with a brand after one negative experience, this rapidly becomes a huge issue. Companies need a proactive approach to customer experience.
The report closes with four takeaways. The first three are sage advice for any business leader. The fourth underlines the point IFS intends to make. Organisations need a holistic approach. One that is backed by enterprise software such as IFS Cloud. Enterprise software can help deliver both moments of service for customers and provide a solution that surfaces organisation-wide insights on data.
Acquisition
Thoma Bravo has agreed to acquire QAD. Thoma Bravo will pay around $2 billion for the company.
SD Worx has acquired launch!, a Dutch company providing SAP SuccessFactors-based implementation, maintenance and outsourcing services. SD Worx did not disclose terms.
Skillsoft has acquired Pluma, Inc. (“Pluma”), a leading digital professional development and executive-quality coaching platform, for approximately $22 million in cash.
Appointment
Access Legal has appointed Ed Jones as Product Manager for Legal Content.
BMC, a global leader in software solutions for the Autonomous Digital Enterprise, announced global sales leadership for its new Go-To-Market (GTM) model to increase focus on customer and partner success. Two veteran leaders are spearheading this effort with Jeff Hardy, Vice President of Americas Sales, and Paul Cant, Vice President of International Sales.
Eckhard Schwarzer, former chief markets officer (CMO) and DATEV’s deputy CEO, retired from Datev on 30 June 2021. Dr Peter Krug succeeds on 1 July 2021. The new member of the board and chief technology officer (CTO) will be Prof Dr Christian Bär.
TravelPerk, the largest global business travel management platform, announced a new partnership with Divvy (now part of Bill.com), the leading spend and expense management platform to bring the best business travel and expense management experience on the planet.
Esker has appointed Matt Tipper as Partner Manager for Northern Europe. Tipper was previously Business Growth and Partner Director at Rimilia, which BlackLine acquired.
Mike Dickersbach has been named vice president of global services for Infor’s Hospitality division.
IRIS has appointed Simon Freeman as the new Managing Director (MD) for Education. Freeman joins from Capita, where he was MD of its local government business.
Outreach announced three senior hires: Mohan Achar, vice president of customer support. Neil Amrhein, vice president of value consulting. Vlad Melnik, vice president of global business development and partnerships. It also revealed the opening of an Atlanta office intending to create a significant number of jobs over the next 18 months.
Business
Asite has joined the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) Tech Partner Programme.
Cloud Inventory has achieved VeracodeTM Verified Standard certification for its cloud inventory management product.
NICE has published a Robo-Ethical framework consisting of five guiding principles:
- Robots must be designed for a positive impact
- Bias-free robotics
- Robots must safeguard individuals
- Robots must be driven by trusted data sources
- Robots must be designed with holistic governance and control
OneStream has launched a certification program for OneStream architects and system administrators. The company has also launched “OneStream Press” and published its first book – the “OneStream Foundation Handbook.” The book is available on Amazon (UK, US)
SAP unveiled released three new services to help customers get the full potential of the cloud using SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP).
Seismic, a global leader in sales enablement, announced it had surpassed $200 million in annual revenue run rate.
ServiceMax has announced its new ServiceMax Partner Xcellence Program. It consists of a ServiceMax Asset 360 Training and Certification program, a dedicated ServiceMax Partner Success Architect, ServiceMax Implementation Advisory Services and the ServiceMax Partner Community.
SoftOne has received a performance certificate from the University of the Aegean (UotA), the only Greek Academic institution that provides credible, structured audit procedures for testing and evaluating the performance of e-invoicing software solutions and applications.
TigerGraph has added several new partners to its ecosystem in the United States, Europe and Asia to help meet the growing demand for its platform.
XANT, the leading enterprise Sales Engagement Platform, has announced an ongoing strategic partnership agreement with EXL, a leading operations management and analytics company.
Customer
Alteryx announced a new multi-year technology partnership with McLaren Racing to help the McLaren Formula 1 team accelerate the insights needed to drive breakthrough outcomes and fuel performance through intelligent analytics automation.
Garsa (Gestores Administrativos Reunidos) is using the Appian Low-Code Automation Platform to automate complex lending and financial management workflows. It is automationing more than 50,000 tasks and saving up to €30,000 every month.
Appogee HR has updated its integration with Xero so that employees no longer need to download payslips to their devices. They can view them from within Appogee.
Krier Foods, Prime Ingredients and Glenwood Snacks have all recently selected Aptean Food & Beverage ERP as their solution of choice.
Atria, one of the leading meat and food companies in the Nordic countries, Estonia and Russia, has chosen Infor PLM for Process (Optiva) as a standardised platform for product development across the group. PacWolf, a leading fulfilment house specialising in e-commerce, has chosen Infor Warehouse Management System (WMS). Deployed via Amazon Web Services (AWS), the multi-tenant cloud application will help PacWolf continue its aggressive growth that has seen the company handle more than 1,500 orders per day.
Servier selected the Oracle Health Sciences Clinical One cloud platform to optimize speed and data accuracy in critical clinical trials.
The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), the world’s leading HR association, has standardized on Qualtrics as their Experience Management platform for their employees and members.
Ramco Systems will implement its ERP software to Aden Ports Development Company (APDC) at their Aden Container Terminal (ACT), deepening its 12-year partnership with Yemen’s largest container terminal.
Leading Brazilian Chemical Distributor quantiQ has switched SAP S/4HANA support to Rimini Street, saving 75% compared to the vendor’s prices.
B2B spending solution Pleo has teamed up with Salt Edge, the leader in developing open banking products, for full compliance with PSD2, thus enabling its 15K+ clients spread across Europe to enjoy value-added services and transparent payment experiences.
UKG has revealed how 2nd.MD, a provider of convenient virtual access to top national clinicians, has used UKG Pro to increase HR agility, empower its people, and achieve a substantial ROI.
Product
The Agiloft contract lifecycle management software is now available via AWS Marketplace
Avaza has launched “Avaza Expenses”. It is available from Google Play and Apple App Stores. The App allows users to create, view, submit, list and add receipts to expenses using the camera.
IRIS is completely updating the user interface of its HR Professional product. The July release sees new fonts, revised colours and resized objects within the application. The new look and feel is more modern and has greater accessibility.
Jenzabar unveiled the latest version of SONIX, adding enhanced admissions and financial aid capabilities to the Student Information System.
Paymerang, a leader in payment automation and invoice automation, has integrated its software with Sage Intacct.
Phenom launched the Phenom Integration and Configuration Experience (IX). It is a collection of self-service tools for HRIT that accelerates and simplifies complex HR systems’ integration, deployment, and ongoing configuration and maintenance. Phenom believes It will cut implementation time by four weeks and saving Phenom customers 20,000 hours this year alone.
The new version SuiteCRM Analytics, V1.4, delivers several new reports, integration improvements covering both the import and export of data, and various minor updates and bug fixes.
The new version of Talentia CPM fully compliant with the European Single Electronic Format (ESEF) standard.
Teamwork has released a new version of its Microsoft Office Add-in. It now integrates Word, Excel, Publisher, PowerPoint, Visio, and Outlook. Users can also sync Teamwork projects with Microsoft Project as well.
Teradata Vantage is now available on Azure. Teradata Vantage is the leading enterprise multi-cloud data analytics software platform, enabling deep analytics that drives meaningful, industry-specific business outcomes for customers.
Yellowfin rolled out version 9.6 of its analytics software. The update includes actionable dashboards, automated business monitoring and improvements to data storytelling.
