A few weeks ago ICT Solutions of Mrieħel, one of the fastest growing ICT companies in Malta, announced the acquisition of ITS Ltd, Malta’s main partner for the popular Sage accounting software.
i-Tech caught up with Keith Fearne, ICT Solutions managing director, to find out what is the motive behind this move.
“ICT Solutions is now in its fifth year of operation, and I can safely say that we are now considered to be one of the leading systems integrators in Malta. It was not easy, as we are competing with companies that have been around for many years. Part of our growth strategy includes acquisitions. After the successful acquisition of Panta Computers in 2010, we felt it was now time to take our company to a next level, by entering the business application field.
“Through the close affinity they have with Sage, ITS Ltd fitted the bill perfectly. They bring to ICT Solutions a leading brand and product, and a customer base. When one adds that with the existing product and services portfolio at ICT Solutions, the result is a very strong set of synergies,” Mr Fearne said.
Mr Fearne explained how Sage has always been very popular in Malta, and is considered the number-one accounting package locally. It is an affordable, yet comprehensive software package, which today has developed to cater also for most of the other software business needs of SMEs, through a number of modules available on the core product. Sage today is a global brand, serving six million customers and has 13,000 employees. This guarantees the continuous development of the product, and gives Sage customers the peace of mind that the product will continue to develop to cater for the latest functional requirements and technologies.
Sage has a large range of modules that are already available in Malta, but which have not been strongly marketed in the past. These include modules like warehousing, inventory management, asset management, payroll and retail point of sale.
“The advantages of having these integrated with the core financial system are many, and we believe that this presents an interesting opportunity for growth. We also want to continue to improve the level of service we are giving to our customers, as having the product is not enough. Finance is a critical part of any business, so we understand that responsiveness to our clients’ needs is key,” added Mr Fearne.
The acquisition of the Sage partnership in Malta comes at a time where the software industry is going through a big shift, with the increasing use of software served in the so-called ‘cloud’ rather than installed on the company’s servers and computers.
What challenges and opportunities does the rise of the ‘cloud’ bring to established software which, for decades, has been successfully residing on local PCs?
“The cloud will provide more challenges to the suppliers of the in-house infrastructure than to the software vendors,” according to the managing director of ICT Solutions.
“Software applications and licenses, as well as set-up and support will still be required, whether they are hosted internally or on the cloud. There is a case to say that, with the bill for infrastructure and its maintenance going down due to cloud deployment, there will be more money to be spent on applications. So rather than seeing the cloud as a challenge, we see it more as an opportunity.”
The opportunities of the cloud and the investment in the Sage partnership are seen as fuel for the growth of both the new partnership and ICT Solutions itself.
“ITS Ltd has had a long and successful relationship with Sage, and we intend to continue to invest to develop that. We are certain that with the new energy being pumped into ITS through this acquisition, we will continue to be the number-one Sage partner in Malta. But we are also determined that through this acquisition, we will continue to build ICT Solutions to become the leading ICT set-up on the island,” concluded Mr Fearne.