Jade hopes security venture will go global
Law enforcement business will bring together expertise in financial services and risk management.
Wednesday, December 14 2011 || Technology || BY Tamlyn Stewart, The Press
Jade announced yesterday that it had sold Empower HR to software support company Fusion5 which would retain existing Empower staff.
Jade managing director Craig Richardson declined to disclose what the business sold for, but said it had been a "reasonably material" part of Jade's business and had been a "good, solid, profitable" part of the business.
Asked whether the new security and law enforcement business would compensate for the contribution Empower usually made to Jade's revenue, Richardson said it was unlikely to do so within the next year but would hopefully do so in the next two to three years.
Jade's average annual revenue was between $40 million and $45m a year, but Richardson said he expected next year's revenue to be from $35m to $40m.
Empower was a very good business but it was a regional business, focused on Australia and New Zealand.
Jade wanted to be in global markets, and in different categories.
The sale would enable Jade Software to focus on the areas of business risk management software, its JOOB mobile product and law enforcement software.
"It's pretty much all to do with us getting much more focused into the sort of global categories we want to play in," Richardson said.
Richardson said Jade's new business would bring together the company's experience in financial services, risk management and law enforcement.
There were more opportunities in law enforcement and national security globally, and there continued to be good investment in those areas in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Britain.
"We see increasing demand for this expertise and technology, especially from financial institutions and government agencies both at home and abroad," he said.
"In national security and law enforcement markets there's still good investment and it's an area we've played very well in the past.
"We've got a growing business in that area so obviously we'd hope over the next two to three years that we'd recover the revenue we've lost from the sale of Empower and hopefully overtake that, that's why we've really pushed this transaction through."
Jade had invested "substantially" in its future growth and extended its law enforcement capabilities for detecting and preventing crime and corruption.
