I understand you may have read on the ISTUG website a message stating that we have had some fundamental changes here at Winnersh.

As I was the architect of these changes I thought it would be a good idea if I started by explaining why I made them.

For the record, I have removed Steve Bailey, Managing Director and all of his direct commercial reports.

Why have I done this?

You have heard my colleague Paul Stobart telling you all about the Sage Group culture and our way of doing business - which is entirely customer centric, service orientated and with a commitment to quality in everything we do.

Steve Bailey and his commercial team were focusing, to my intense frustration, on peripheral issues.

Now, I intend to rebuild the commercial team here at Sage Enterprise over the next few weeks and months, but the new people will be focused on what matters for Sage – and that means customer service.

Because that’s what matters to you – serving you better and delivering, for you, a superb range of best of breed products.

I can assure you that we will maintain an absolute focus on getting the basics right – delivery of service, quality of product and reliability of our offering to our loyal customers and resellers here in the UK.

That is why I am delighted to have on board with me, David MacDermott, Development Director and Steve Howell, Customer Service Director. They are both doing an outstanding job.

Dave MacDermott has been with the business for over 14 years and is the architect behind the software. His ideas, his vision and importantly his passion for this product range gave me the greatest confidence in the future direction of technology.

Steve Howell, a recent recruit shares the same passion as I do for customer service.

When I look back on the 22 years of Sage’s history, - one thing which has made the business so successful is our obsession for customer service – especially in an IT industry where customers rely on us to keep their businesses running.

I have every confidence that Steve will deliver on this promise.

And you can meet both Dave and Steve in the coffee break later this morning.

Let me share with you my own thoughts on the business and where we are going.

Lets start with some facts.

We have over 3000 mid market customers – businesses with over 100 employees.

We are market leader of this sector.

It is clear from this slide that the vast majority of our customers are UK based.

Some of the UK’s biggest brands and most respected companies use our software.

I have heard from both the reseller community and our customers that there is a perception out there that Sage is somehow only interested in small businesses with a sub four user system.

The fact that there are 150 of you here today, many of whom have substantially more than four users, is direct evidence that we are very serious about customers like you.

I have such confidence in this software that we at Sage are migrating our entire UK IT system to Sage Enterprise.

Currently we have around 200 concurrent users but by the end of the project we will have over 2000 employees using the system………. And growing.

Another fact

91% of our customers are serviced by our channel partners.

The success of Sage has been due to our commitment to ensuring that our channel partners are of the highest quality.

The reason for this is that most users require a local partner who can develop an in-depth knowledge and understanding of their requirements and provide the necessary skills and resources to ensure that they have a solution that precisely fits their individual needs.

Some of our customers deal with us directly.

I have to say that I don’t believe that this is the right way to look after our customers.

What Sage does best is to build great products and provides superlative service to our channel partners so that they, in turn, can provide you with the best possible locally delivered service – including customisation, training, consulting and integration with the rest of your IT solution.

This slide shows how many employees work in each department.

The chart demonstrates to you our commitment to the two fundamentals of our business.

First, outstanding customer service and

Second, the highest quality product for our customers.

Over 75% of our employees are in these two areas.

That’s all I have to say about this slide.

In summary, even though I sound like a very scratched record, I want to re-affirm once more what our business is all about.

First – customer service – if we don’t get customer service right we are dead.

I know things can be improved and believe me we are determined to get this right.

Second – product quality – we intend to keep on delivering to you the best possible product to meet your needs and if you don’t believe we are doing that then let me know.

Third, channel quality. I know we have the best channel partners in the UK. Our resellers provide you with a service level that Sage could never match. They are there for you on site to answer and solve any issues you may have with your systems.

Oh, and by the way, if you are not receiving the service levels you expect, email me.

I already practice what Paul preaches.

I talk to customers and channel partners not only every month but actually every day. I’d be delighted to get to know every single one of you.

You know my email address – send me one.

So, ladies and gentlemen, in conclusion

I hope you feel you know me a bit better now – what I stand for and what I believe in – and therefore what Sage is all about.

Customer Service

Quality products

Delivered by a highly skilled reseller channel.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you.