Sybase SA, local representative of enterprise database solutions company Sybase, is buying back into the parent company. It has also announced its initiative to tap into the developing African market.
Worldwide, Sybase plans to expand its product base into the mobile commerce and enterprise portal arena. The announcement came at the South African leg of the company's international road show.
Sybase's marketing strategy into Africa will see the company appoint distributors into various countries, which would service specific regions, identified as Western Africa, Central Africa and Northern Africa.
The first of these distributors has already been established in Nigeria and activities are underway to find similar partners in Uganda, Kenya, Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia and Morocco. The SADC region will be serviced from SA.
Martin Britz, the Sybase Africa manager based in SA, will manage the initiative and administrative functions will be performed by Sybase SA.
Britz says Sybase's mobile and enterprise technology solutions in particular will be marketed into Africa. "Africa has to fast track its technology infrastructure development, and mobile and other e-based technologies will be the key enablers to bring their businesses on par with global operations. South Africa is also the ideal springboard for this market penetration because of our understanding of African markets and business needs."
Sybase's newly developed technologies, such as the Enterprise portal, Enterprise Application Studio and mobile technologies, are already being marketed in the regions, and Sybase hopes to boost its presence through a $1 million donation of software and services to universities in Africa. "We are also investigating alliances and partnerships with other solution providers on the continent, as businesses in Africa prefer to entrust their IT needs to a local organisation."
Sybase says it will focus primarily on the financial, banking and insurance industry, the public sector and the telecommunications industry. The products will be sold with full support and upgrading facilities in the country of purchase.
Pivotal to Sybase's new market thrust is its Enterprise Portal and iAnywhere product set that will allow organisations to integrate their e-commerce and back-office systems into a mobile enterprise solution.
"Sybase has targeted the mobile and wireless, e-business portal and Internet financial solutions as the areas where it can differentiate itself most significantly," says Sybase senior VP Raj Nathan. "Our foundational business provided us with a solid platform to address emerging markets with new products related to our core technology capabilities. We focus only on those areas where we are confident that Sybase will rank among the top three products."
Sybase South Africa will approach the South African market with a similar strategy, and will also continue to support its existing installed client base for business intelligence, enterprise database solutions, and PowerBuilder RAD tools.
The ambient trend in IT and business strategy, Nathan says, are aligned now more than ever before in the history of IT. "It's not inconceivable to think that the CIO of a company can become that company's CEO."
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