Spinoff from Software Spectrum

By ADAM GIFFORD

The 55 managers and staff of Software Spectrum's NZ and Australian professional services division have bought the concern, after its United States parent moved to quit the consulting business.

The company, renamed Naratis from the Latin word for knowledge and discernment, will be run by Rob Cooper in New Zealand and former Software Spectrum Asia-Pacific managing director David Colving in Australia.

Mr Cooper said the division's turnover was $7 million last year on both sides of the Tasman, and the sale price was "a fraction rather than a multiple of that."

Software Spectrum is the country's largest reseller of desktop software, from companies such as Microsoft and IBM/Lotus, to the corporate sector and has developed a range of services to manage those licences.

Its professional services division established a niche in the finance industry, offering services such as IT business case development, advising on standard operating environments and installing knowledge management and e-business solutions.

"We do things like [Windows] NT infrastructure projects where we go into an organisation with 5000 PCs and advise them how to create the environment needed to manage those PCs, upgrade software, lower the total cost of ownership and so on," Mr Cooper said.

"We don't do operations and facilities management but we get involved on a project level, training a customer's people to implement or working with an outsourced IT provider."

He said the break from Software Spectrum would allow Naratis to form closer partnerships with systems integrators like Computerland and Southmark, because it would no longer be seen as a competitor for licence sales.

While Software Spectrum treated its professional services division in each centre as a separate entity, Naratis intended to develop close cooperation between the Wellington, Sydney and Melbourne offices.

It was also considering opening an office in Auckland.

New Zealand clients include WestpacTrust, ANZ Bank and Tranz Rail. Across the Tasman it works with Qantas, Goodman Fielder, Westpac, ANZ Bank, NAB, Telstra, Commonwealth Bank and AXA.