Malaysia as Vital R&D Hub for Exact’s Cloud Portfolio

Exact to Expand Regional Centre in Malaysia with Increased Workforce and Funding

Kuala Lumpur, 4 July 2013 – Global software company, Exact will be expanding its regional development centre in Malaysia by adding headcount by as much as 50 percent this year. The regional centre will also receive a significant portion of Exact’s additional research and development funding for 2013 to finance the development of Exact’s new cloud offering.

Exact’s Asia Development Centre (ADC) houses Exact’s international software development team and serves as a regional hub for Southeast Asia. The Research and Development (R&D) division in the regional centre become an important focus point for the Dutch-based ERP company, as it fuels the expansion and development of Exact’s cloud portfolio, that will be internationally rolled out progressively in the coming months.

Hartmut Wagner, Managing Director of Cloud Solutions, Exact.

“As the cloud software represents a step away from the technology used in Exact’s other major product lines, we definitely need to form different teams within the ADC and seek out new employees that have the necessary skillsets to further develop our cloud-based offering,” said Hartmut Wagner, Exact’s Managing Director of Cloud Solutions.

The ADC started with an initial workforce of 56 people in 2000 and grew to 232 employees in 2012. Exact is planning to add another hundred people in 2013. In the early years of the ADC, the team focused on localizing the existing software products of Exact for the Asian markets and reworking the software to ensure they were tailored to its regional customers, who are predominantly SMEs. With the new cloud offering came a shift in the ADC’s responsibilities.

“For the development of our cloud portfolio, we need people that bring different skills than we needed before. That is why we have been actively hiring and putting in place staff retention programs which include career growth plans based on the expertise of the individuals. We are highly positive to achieve this growth within ADC” said Srinivas Sampathkumar, Product Development Director of Exact ADC.

S.Srinivas, Product Development Director, Exact Asia Development Centre, sharing at the Exact ADC’s town hall meeting.

Srinivas added that the ADC is primarily looking to recruit software engineers who are familiar with cloud computing and programming to join the R&D division. The company has increased its R&D funding in 2012 from 11 percent to 14 percent of total revenues. A major part of the additional R&D funding will be ploughed into the expansion of Exact’s cloud portfolio, Exact Online.

“This expansion of our regional R&D hub is an important milestone for Exact. It is a move in the right direction as cloud solutions become more ubiquitous. We are optimistic that we will see a positive take-up among the SMEs as cloud solutions will provide them with a most cost-effective option with the pay-per-use model. What we need now is the right talent that are the best fit to build these solutions,” ended Wagner.

Exact’s ERP solutions are designed for small to mid-sized businesses especially those in the manufacturing, wholesale distribution sector and professional services companies. Its clients in Malaysia include Secret Recipe, Slumberland Malaysia and Adecco.