Reference Story amexus Informationstechnik GmbH & Co. KG

IT service provider amexus increases recurring revenues through d.velop product portfolio.

amexus & d.velop – a partnership with a vision

As digitalization becomes more widespread, IT service providers are increasingly facing new challenges. The shortage of skilled workers, for example, collides with an increased demand from customers for digitalization projects. New competitors are emerging that offer digital platforms with services for production and logistics processes. 

A good thing then that the product portfolio offered by d.velop AG brings additional, recurring revenue within reach. Projects can be completed more quickly and recurring revenues ensure sustainable growth. The new products and services improve customer loyalty beyond the already existing business relations. Further, opportunities for cross-selling and up-selling arise more frequently.

Simplify and redesign processes with strong partners

For more than 26 years, d.velop AG has been helping its customers, companies and organizations to simplify and redesign processes and procedures with the means of digitalization. For this, d.velop AG relies on strong sales partners. 

One of those partners is amexus Informationstechnik GmbH & Co. KG in Ahaus, Germany. With more than 100 employees in six business areas, the company is active nationwide in small and medium-sized companies, as well as in corporate groups. amexus relies on the products from d.velop AG, specifically the solutions that d.velop has developed for Microsoft SharePoint: ecspand and d.velop for Microsoft 365.

“We are SharePoint service providers”, describes Dominik Stange, head of Business Unit Collaboration at amexus, “and the solutions ecspand and d.velop for Microsoft 365 from d.velop AG are the ‘next big thing’ for us. Nothing is as mature as these products. From our point of view, the d.velop products are unrivalled and a useful addition for our customers.”

ecspand is a software solution with which companies can expand their on-premise SharePoint system to a complete document management system. Among other things, ecspand enables the creation and use of digital files, brings transparency to processes and filing structures and shines with an intuitive navigation. Contract management, accounts payable processing and long-term archiving are only a few of the points on ecspand’s comprehensive feature list.

A practical example: With ecspand, amexus was able to introduce a digital file solution at the Bremer Kreditbank AG (BKB). The bank was looking for a new document management system in 2017, as the old one was neither user-friendly nor intuitive to use and above all did not allow interactive collaboration on documents. Since BKB had already introduced a new intranet based on SharePoint, it was an obvious choice to use the existing functionalities, extending them with ecspand.

For amexus, d.velop products such as ecspand have been a welcome opportunity to expand their own service catalogue: “This increases recurring revenue”, Dominik Stange describes, “and with d.velop products we generate added value for the customer faster and help him more quickly with his daily needs.” 

In the past, according to Stange, a project at a customer’s site took around 60 to 80 days. Today, it often takes around 20 days. And there are more follow-up projects – anyone who has introduced a digital file can easily expand the range of functions, for instance with digital contract management, a digital personnel file or a digital machine file. These solutions can be mapped with the d.velop services.  

d.velop for Microsoft 365: “We grow with our customers”

While ecspand is the solution for companies maintaining their IT infrastructure themselves (“on premise”), d.velop for Microsoft 365 is a cloud solution (SaaS). This enables companies to expand their online SharePoint to a comprehensive document management system.

Using the SaaS variant brings a huge advantage: companies can react flexibly to changing requirements. “For us, the needs of the customer are the benchmark,” says Dominik Stange. The system is scalable. For example, a digital accounts payable invoice processing system can grow with the company without the company having to purchase new servers. “In the past, we often had long implementation times; today we can set up new workstations overnight,” says Stange.

This means low start-up costs, especially for young companies or start-ups. Companies only pay for the services they actually use. And for IT service providers and d.velop sales partners, there is no longer any pressure to focus exclusively on larger deals or orders. Stange: “As a result, we have many more smaller-sized projects that generate ongoing revenue over time. We grow with our customers; as they increase their use of d.velop’s solutions, we participate in that growth with increased revenue”.

Good customer retention, upselling and cross-selling opportunities for d.velop sales partners

“Our cooperation with amexus is not only characterized by a high degree of professionalism”, says Ingo Dorendorf, the responsible partner manager at d.velop AG, “it is also marked by excellent cooperation and an open and fair exchange. Especially at the beginning of the partnership, this ensured smoothly run projects and the necessary transfer of knowledge to amexus”.

The contact between amexus and d.velop started in 2007, when amexus was supposed to create a website for d.velop. In the meantime, the service provider has become a successful sales partner. Ingo Dorendorf: “By working with d.velop, partners can greatly improve customer retention while generating new upselling and cross-selling opportunities. Those opportunities can take many forms. For example, a digital accounts payable solution can be ideally supplemented with digital contract management, a secure archive to meet regulatory needs, a digital signature solution or the creation of structured digital files, such as personnel files, machine or product files. 

amexus also makes intensive use of these possibilities. Stange: “We are closer to our customers, in good part because we are now in ongoing contact. Cross-selling and up-selling are possible, customer loyalty is better. All of this is very worthwhile for us.” Dominik Stange summarizes some advantages of a d.velop sales partner:

• Fewer large projects, more small projects generating revenue over a longer period of time
• Scalable products
• Shorter project turn-around times
• Better technology
• Sales partner grows with his customer – through share of revenue
• Secure long-term planning through minimum subscription terms
• Lower internal costs
• A reliable partner
• Sales partners can better serve and support their customers

Partner Manager Ingo Dorendorf looks to the future: “We value active partnerships and long-term customer relationships. We stay in the background, but if desired, we act together. Organizations and strategies in companies change, there is always something to do”.

This is exactly why d.velop AG is also looking for more partners. Dominik Stange praises the smooth functioning of the partnership: “We have a cooperative relationship and we always find someone ready to listen. Together, we are solution-oriented.”