Progress Software has closed its local office and appointed Rick Parry, former MD of Progress Software South Africa, as the company's non-exclusive distributor in sub-Saharan Africa. This follows on a major global restructuring of Progress's business operations.
Parry's new company, Albi Investment Group Services (AIGS), has secured the local rights to a range of Progress Software offerings, including the OpenEdge application platform, the Sonic enterprise service bus, and Actional, the services-oriented architecture management solution.
"Progress powers some of the largest companies in South Africa and partners and their customers will be anxious to know that there will be no disruption to service and support as AIGS will continue the 22-year-old record that Progress has enjoyed here," says Parry, MD of AIGS.
The move is in line with Progress's changing focus globally. The company has restructured its business significantly in recognition of changing software deployment methodologies.
"Progress previously had a predominantly partner-based business, with partners selling on to the SME market," Parry notes. "It was an extremely successful strategy, but over time the organisation realised that it had to re-think its product strategy as a result of changing market needs. It has now geared itself to help large enterprises become more operationally responsive and, as such, it is looking to work with distributors in emerging markets such as South Africa, rather than having a direct presence in the country. That's where AIGS comes in. I can assure Progress customers in South Africa that it will be business as usual as far as they concerned."
Over the past decade, through a process of acquisition and development, Progress built a portfolio of products around service-oriented architecture (SOA). Parry says the company is now targeting that expertise at larger organisations that need to leverage their existing IT assets so that they can improve operational efficiencies.
"Large enterprises and multinationals have many disparate IT systems, a situation which continues to be a major challenge," he says. "Progress is focusing on providing solutions to help these organisations better sweat their existing IT assets, and to be more responsive to market conditions and customer interactions. As a result, the company needed a totally different infrastructure, go-to-market strategy and messaging. Its customers are different now, with its wallet share existing in the Fortune 500 segment of the market globally."
It's this shift in strategy that necessitated the streamlining of Progress's presence in South Africa. Parry says it made sense for the company to appoint a local distributor and reseller. He put forward a proposal to Progress outlining the benefits of returning to the distributorship model the company had previously had in this country and the agreement was concluded.
As the new distributor, AIGS is also BEE-compliant, having earned Level 4 status. Parry says this is a critical achievement, which would have been exceptionally difficult to secure while Progress, a Nasdaq-listed company, operated through a subsidiary, with a range of attendant legal issues to resolve.
"Now, as a distributor, we have seamlessly been rated and found to be BEE-compliant, a status we will seek to improve in line with the Codes of Good Practice," says Parry. "There is no doubt at all that any company that is not BEE-compliant is at a disadvantage, so that is a major benefit to the business."
With its headquarters in Fourways, AIGS is staffed by many of Progress's previous employees, further ensuring stability for the large Progress user base. Parry himself was the sales director for Progress's previous local distributor over a decade ago, and has more than 12 years' experience in the Progress domain.
"We are porting our partners and their customers from Progress Software South Africa to AIGS structures, so all parties can be assured of continuity and dedicated service and support," Parry concludes.
Share
Editorial contacts