Four veterans of the IT industry have joined forces to launch a new player in the software industry, the Magix group of companies.
Chris Hills, CEO of MGX through the highs and lows from 1993 to 2002, Amir Lubashevsky and Tzvi Appel, founders of Exsol and directors of the listed EC-Hold group, and Hedley Hurwitz who developed and sold the Oculus business to AST, teamed up to do an MBO of Magic SA from MGX in 2003. Magic SA was, and remains, the exclusive distributor for Africa of the full range of products and services of Magic Software Enterprise of Israel (listed on Nasdaq). The MBO included the professional services division of some 25 consultants.
Since the MBO, the four have moved quickly to add products and services to focus the Magix group on the Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) space with particular reference to the compliance and corporate governance obligations imposed on most large organizations. As a result of the enhanced offerings the name was changed from Magic SA to Magix.
Because of their international network of contacts and particularly Tzvi and Amir`s extensive network in Israel, Magix has been able to secure exclusive distribution rights to some very innovative and ground breaking technologies and are continuously adding to their basket.
The Magix group now boasts an impressive array of technology to allow integration of disparate legacy systems within an organization and optimum usage and control of such systems to achieve compliance with the latest corporate governance requirements. The technologies have a particular focus on risk management, fraud detection, internal audit and compliance, all in a unique and non invasive manner.
Magix has a broad, blue chip, client base spread across both the public and private sector and has been able to achieve significant deals in the public sector because of the unique nature of the technology. It has strong annuity income from its professional services team and its maintenance base.
When asked for comment all Chris Hills would say is that he is enjoying keeping a low profile and was really motivated by building a private group of companies which he felt had "unlimited potential". In the light of the track record of these individuals this could be a case of "watch this space". We certainly got the impression that Chris had a point to prove following the spectacular success of MGX and then an equally spectacular fall from grace following the disastrous acquisition of the CCH group.
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