DWS snaps up SAP skills on the cheap

DWS Advanced Business Solutions has "opportunistically" acquired [PDF] a consultancy with SAP, Peoplesoft and JD Edwards skills for $800,000.

The consultancy, Graeme V Jones and Associates (GVJ), had been a Peoplesoft partner since 1995 and an SAP partner since 1997.

It had 17 staff at offices in Melbourne and Sydney and "a strong base of clients in the Government and corporate sectors", DWS said in a statement.

"Graeme Jones & Associates has an excellent reputation in the SAP and Peoplesoft space and this is an area of the market which DWS has not actively pursued," DWS chief Danny Wallis said.

"We are optimistic that with some focused management attention we will be able to return the GVJ business to its previous highs (during 2007) when it was turning over some $29 million in revenue".

By contrast, DWS said 2010 revenues for the GVJ business were expected to be approximately $4 million.

GVJ founder Graeme Jones indicated he would remain on board with the company for the next two years "to assist with the rebuilding process".

He said in a statement he believed "strong cross-selling opportunities" within the DWS Group would "facilitate a rapid turnaround in the business' performance."

Jones said of his firm's deteriorating performance that the company "had been pursuing other business opportunities which distracted us from our core business activities (consulting)".

SAP skills have been in hot demand for a number of years in Australia, leading to consolidation in the space.

Most recently, Fujitsu Australia paid $48 million to acquire the SAP business of Sydney-based Supply Chain Consulting.