Aareon AG Acquires 1st Touch
9th July, 2012
Southampton UK, 9th July 2012: Aareon AG, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aareal Bank AG and the leading consultancy and IT systems house for the European property sector, has announced that it has acquired 1st Touch Limited, the UK’s leading developer of mobile systems for the social housing and public sectors. The decision is seen as a reflection of Aareon’s belief in the significant opportunities presented by mobile technology in the property sector across Europe and as complementary to the Group’s other software investments in the sector.
Commenting on the news, Dr. Manfred Alflen CEO of Aareon AG said; “1st Touch is the recognized market leader for the supply of mobile technology to the UK social housing and public sectors. Clearly with the rapid growth of demand for this kind of mobile solution, across Europe, the opportunities are enormous. Together we aim to capitalize on these.
“Following the acquisition, 1st Touch will continue to provide mobile solutions across multiple back office and ERP Housing systems and will become an essential element of our technology strategy, in the UK and the rest of Europe. It is this independence which makes this such a good acquisition for Aareon AG and with the backing that the Group can offer, we are confident that 1st Touch will continue to grow significantly.”
Robert Dent the Managing Director of 1st Touch echoed Dr. Alflen’s comments adding, “This is excellent news for both 1st Touch employees and also for our customers. We look forward to witnessing the first fruits of this very compatible union and therein taking full advantage of the opportunities now available to us.”
About Aareon AG (www.aareon.com)
Aareon AG, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Aareal Bank AG, is Europe’s leading consultancy and IT systems house for the property sector. The business activities focus on optimising the IT-supported business processes of property companies and their market environment. The company´s range of products and services comprises consultancy, software and services. In addition, Aareon takes over its customers´ outsourced business processes. Aareon has more than 50 years of market experience, specific sector expertise, IT competence and enjoys an excellent relationship with customers, associations and partners.
More than 50,000 users throughout Europe use Aareon systems to manage over 9.5 million rental units. Aareon Group has offices in 20 locations in Europe, of which 10 are in Germany. Aareon has a presence at 20 sites (10 of which are in Germany) and operates in Germany, France, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. In 2011, Aareon AG recorded sales of EUR 159.5 million and earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) of EUR 25.1 million.
The company’s ERP product portfolio for efficient process design, in Germany comprises Wodis Sigma, SAP®-based solutions such as Blue Eagle as well as GES and WohnData. Aareon´s international subsidiaries offer country-specific ERP solutions.
Integrated Services and industry-specific add-on solutions round off the product portfolio, facilitating among other things process-efficient cooperation between property companies and their business partners. These include Internet-based solutions, service portals and document management systems. In Germany, Aareon also offers computer centre services, including software as a service from the exclusive Aareon Cloud.
About 1st Touch (www.1sttouch.com)
1st Touch, based in Southampton UK, has enabled dozens of field workforce-based organisations to embrace new mobile technologies and so achieve significant savings, greater productivity and more cost-effective use of resources. 1st Touch Mobile delivers clear and unique benefits: – Reduced costs to organisations because airtime is minimised and the system is always available with or without airtime. – Flexibility through simple customer control over forms creation and amendment. – Integration to multiple back office and other enterprise software applications, so that data is entered only once.
With its widely acclaimed mobile technology, 1st Touch has a clear focus on the Social Housing and Local Government markets. Many social housing providers and local authorities, at large, now benefit from the fast and tangible, best of breed benefits that 1st Touch mobile technology delivers to the enterprise.
To date, over 50% of the social housing market, which has deployed mobile technology, has chosen to implement 1st Touch. In local government, 1st Touch has already been adopted for a wide range of mobile workforce uses. Ready to use applications for local authority organisations include: Public Buildings, Highways/Street Services, Environmental/Waste Management, Revenues and Benefits, together with Planning Control and Trading Standards.
1st Touch is a Windows Embedded Technology Gold Partner and ISV Gold Partner with Microsoft.
