Softelligence, one of the local software companies with the highest sales growth rates in 2010 (172%), which estimates this year it could double its sales, was founded in 2006, when Adrian and Teodor Blidarus, each of whom worked for a different software company, decided they could not pursue their own ideas as employees, and the economy was favorable to opening a business.
“This was during the years 2006-2007, when things were going very well in all sectors. We were closer to the leasing market and leasing companies operating on this market were developing much faster than their internal organization allowed them to, so they felt the need to make up for the lack of certain processes though software systems. This is how eCare came about, our first product in the OMNi e-Business suite,” Adrian Blidarus told ZF in an interview.
Since in 2006-2007 the local economy was in full development, Softelligence’s owners say their main problem at the time was the lack of experience in various adjacent, but essential, segments of the business, such as how to sell or negotiate a contract, and how to manage complex budgets.
2006-2007 was a time of growth for the company, when industries such as insurance and leasing were going strong, but in 2008-2010 they suffered an adjustment and demand for one of the company’s products fell, meaning Softelligence had to develop in a different direction.
“We were able to change direction very fast, since we were a small company. We developed other products, we also entered the debt collection market with a product very much adapted to the crisis, which we developed together with TotalSoft, and which helped us replace what we had lost with eCare,” specified Adrian Blidarus.
From EUR15,000 in 2007, the company’s sales rose 10 times since 2008 and then, despite the recession, grew to EUR200,000 in 2009. One year later, the sales more than doubled. How come? For the provider of e-Business solutions and customer relationship management solutions (CRM) integrated with ERP (enterprise resource planning), the “secret” of growth was the increase in the number of big clients for its suite of applications and its gaining big clients for the segment of consulting services, project management and high-end outsourcing (very specialized outsourcing).
The company’s clients include PwC, Ericsson, Novero, Genpact, Blue Air, Eurolines, Durex, Scholl and Catena. It also has many contracts with leasing companies such as OTP Leasing, Raiffeisen Leasing, Tiriac Leasing and Deutsche Leasing.
(English version by Daniela Stoican)