AngelNews goes with SAP

AngelNews, the information service about companies “that go from nowhere to somewhere very quickly” has turned to SAP’s Business ByDesign Cloud application to help cope with its own rapid growth rate.

Founded five years ago “as a hobby” by CEO Modewenna Rees-Mogg, AngelNews quickly turned into a success story by catering for what she calls “Dragon's Den audience”. The company has been using the CRM part of Business ByDesign since the autumn and is considering implementing the finance and project-management modules.

“We needed to invest in technology to help us manage our client accounts and better manage opportunities and marketing,” said Rees-Mogg. “Until this point we were using spreadsheets, which were becoming difficult to manage accurately and were resulting in costly errors.”

Brand awareness and word of mouth recommendations played a part in the choice, but AngelNews was set on installing a Cloud-based system. “We chose SAP because we wanted something that was on demand so that we didn’t have high IT costs. The Starter Pack was perfect for us because although we only wanted to start with CRM, we do have the intention and option of using more of the SAP Business ByDesign suite moving forward,” said Rees-Mogg.

While the SAP brand can influence companies like AngelNews and professional services firm De Villiers Walton, another recent Business ByDesign customer, it also carries some negative connotations.

Recycling terminal firm Renew now uses the CRM, inventory and accounting elements of Business ByDesign. “I can say the SAP decision was not a popular decision on my board,” admitted CEO Kaveh Memari.

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