By ADAM GIFFORD
Three New Zealand software companies used the annual JD Edwards user conference last week as a springboard for sales into the North American market.
PST Software, Cosyn and Finzsoft Solutions were at Quest in Denver with help from Trade New Zealand, which subsidises clusters of exporters to attend trade shows.
Quest attracts more than 7000 customers and prospects, mostly chief information and financial officers who are more likely to have access to company chequebooks than the "propellerheads" who attend more technical shows such as IBM's Common.
Quest also attracts hundreds of partners - companies that sell software or services around JD Edwards' core systems - some of whom are potential resellers for the Kiwi contingent.
Cosyn director Trevor Middleton said Quest was the largest gathering of AS/400 or iSeries users - the IBM server JD Edwards' software was originally built to run on.
Cosyn makes several tools for the iSeries, including Audit Trail/400 to simplify tracking changes, Power Page/400, which automatically alerts staff when something goes wrong with the server, and Spool Manager/400 to simplify print file management.
Middleton said he had a "promising" approach from an iSeries data replication tool provider who wanted to rebadge Cosyn tools to extend its own product line.
"I also had a guy come by this morning and say, 'I've got five servers. I'll take five licences and cut you a cheque in the morning.' That pays for the trip."
While some analysts predicted sales of JD Edwards' software could dip because of its planned merger with PeopleSoft and Oracle's hostile takeover bid for PeopleSoft, Middleton said people at the show seemed prepared to buy the right products to improve their businesses.
He said Audit Trail/400 was attracting particular interest because of Sarbanes-Oxley, a new law passed by Congress in the wake of the Enron collapse requiring publicly listed companies to have adequate and fully-auditable financial controls.
PST Software used to build custom data warehouses. When prices for that kind of work dropped, it packaged its expertise into an out-of-the-box business intelligence tool called Q4bis, which extracts data from enterprise planning systems such as JD Edwards' and allows it to be analysed by executives in areas such as sales and marketing who are unlikely to have many technology skills.
A server licence and five seats costs about US$20,000 ($34,000), but chief executive Herbert Schoenek said all US sales so far had been for enterprise licences at US$75,000 for unlimited seats.
"Q4bis is cheaper than established competitors like Cognos and Microstrategy and far simpler to install and use," he said.
PST's first trip to Quest in 2001 failed to produce any sales, as companies froze spending in the wake of the September 11 attacks.
It returned last year, and by August had secured its first North American sale to process control automation specialist Caltrol.
By last week's conference it had got in the door to make its pitch to seven US companies and made seven sales - a strike rate that gave it prominent names such as Memorex and Lumileds (a joint venture between Agilent and Philips Lighting) to add to its booth display.
Schoenek said PST left Quest with more than 200 good leads and at least 20 solid prospects.
"We are gaining traction," he said.
It has also appointed a master distributor in Germany who is lining up suitable resellers for Q4bis.
The third "Questee", Finzsoft, went public two years ago to raise money for expansion overseas.
Its Sovereign banking and finance software has about 30 per cent of the market among New Zealand finance companies, insurance companies and credit unions.
* Adam Gifford attended Quest as a guest of JD Edwards.
NZ software companies make most of US exposure
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