MATERNA – 25 years of success
Cutting edge innovations
Dortmund, 27 June 2005
This year MATERNA Information & Communications looks back on a quarter of a century of successful company history. As one of the leading independent software companies, MATERNA now employs over 1,000 staff and is active on an international scale with the two Business Units Information and Communications. In the year 2004 the company achieved a turnover of 120 million euros. MATERNA has operated profitably throughout the complete company history and safely survived those difficult years that the information technology and communications sectors have been through.
“Our future growth will be based on four pillars: innovative strength, investment in other companies, international expansion and employee growth”, the managing partners Dr. Winfried Materna and Helmut an de Meulen explain.
Innovations have the utmost priority at MATERNA. In order to consolidate its position on the market, the company is currently working on themes such as IP Multimedia Subsystems, Corporate GSM, Mobile Virtual Network Enablers and the whole field of content within the environment of mobile communications networks. The technological lead which MATERNA has in the fields of GSM and UMTS is to be extended even further. Market leadership in IT Service Management will be expanded as well into Business Service Management and Service Level Management within the Business Unit Information.
In addition to the growth which results from its own innovative strength, MATERNA will focus more on acquiring stakes in other companies in future. Just recently MATERNA has invested in SAP know-how by acquiring a SAP consulting company. By becoming a shareholder in the mobile network operator In&Phone in Switzerland, MATERNA has already positioned itself very well in the market of so-called Corporate GSM solutions.
Today, global expansion is a high priority: on the way to becoming an international company MATERNA is continuously increasing the number of its branches and expanding its sales network. MATERNA began its foreign activities in Austria in 1995. Many other branches followed. In order to ease market entry, the company also relies on local partners in order to strengthen indirect sales. In most European countries and even in America, the Middle East and Asia, telecommunications providers put their trust in mobile and fixed line solutions from the Anny Way brand. At the beginning of this year, MATERNA took over two IT companies in Sweden and Finland to strengthen its leading national position in IT service management in Europe as well.
From Dortmund to the whole world
MATERNA’s beginnings go back to the year 1980, when Dr. Winfried Materna, who was the head of a research project at the University of Dortmund and Helmut an de Meulen, Assistant at the Dortmund University Chair for IT, decided to support companies with the connecting up of the, at that time, widely separated worlds of PCs and mainframes. The first orders were concerned with the setting up of computer networks. The managing directors focused on reliability and quality from the word go.
“We were already aware at that time that the IT and communications field was going to have fantastic prospects. In spite of that, the entrepreneurial risk was quite a burden. We worked round the clock to get projects finished on time and to gain ground bit by bit. After all, we only had our know-how to take to market”, Dr. Materna remembers. “Our advantage was that we had learnt to work and think in complex and demanding structures. That is why we quickly made a name for ourselves. Whenever things got complicated, we were the right people to get in touch with.“
At that time the two IT experts were on their own, they only had support from free-lancers, usually students from Dortmund University. MATERNA still has excellent relations to the Universities near their headquarters. The loyalty of employees is astounding: 30% of the staff has been with the company for 10 years or more .
In the following years MATERNA often proved its skill at integrating technical systems. Ten years after the company was founded, it had distinguished itself as one of the most important contacts in this field.
In the middle of the 90s, MATERNA established itself as a partner for innovative system solutions for German public authorities with its Business Unit Information. For example, MATERNA jointly developed the nationwide IT procedures for the IT supported customs processing for the Federal Ministry of Finance. One of the latest major projects is the development of a content management solution for the federal authorities within the framework of the Germany government initiative “BundOnline 2005”.
The management of complex IT landscapes also developed to be one of the further focuses of the company. Small, medium-sized and large companies and public authorities rely on MATERNA’s skill in these areas.
Also in the 90s, as the boom in the liberalised telecommunications market emerged, specialists for setting up and extending mobile phone and fixed line services were needed by the network operators. Once again MATERNA quickly proved its skills here.
Five years ago, triggered by its success in the telecommunications field, MATERNA created the Anny Way brand, which is marketed internationally very successfully by the Business Unit Communications. Today the products include the mobile added value services and services for fixed line networks on the basis of SMS, WAP, MMS and mobile Java. MATERNA is the biggest international provider in the field of “fixed line SMS“. World-wide a large number of renowned network operators, service providers and companies number among their customers. “Eight years ago, mobile phone and above all SMS activities were the start into what was at that time a new business for us, and which now contributes to 40% of turnover”, Helmut an de Meulen summarises. “Our comprehensive know-how in mobile data services now puts us in a position to develop high quality products and solutions in new fields such as combining fixed line and mobile networks or in the field of content, and enables us to sell these successfully around the world.“ The excellent quality of Anny Way products has been recognised again and again around the globe. Just a few days ago the Mobile Data Gateway in London for O2 UK operations, was awarded with the Global Messaging award in the category “Best SMS/MMS network infrastructure or platform“.
The Business Unit Information is now developing solutions for the optimisation of processes in companies and public authorities. The target is the economic and functional optimisation of all IT components. The comprehensive approach to solutions includes the fields of business service management, customer service and support, business portals and e-government. At the beginning of the year MATERNA extended its portfolio to support companies with the integration of business service management (BSM) strategies. In this way MATERNA is focusing even more on process consultancy services at the customers, which, together with technical implementation, are gaining ever more importance in projects. In the past ten years MATERNA has developed into one of the market leaders in the field of IT service management in Europe.
Three years ago MATERNA extended its management team: Klaus D. Grote took up the new position of Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and Managing Director in March 2002. In this position he is responsible for the finance and accounting departments, controlling, administration and the in-house information technology.
MATERNA GmbH
As a leading software company in the fields of information and communications technology MATERNA employs around 1,050 staff worldwide and achieved a turnover of 120 million euros in 2004. In addition to the head office in Dortmund, the company is represented throughout Germany with branches and subsidiaries as well as in France, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Finland, Great Britain, the Czech Republic, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, Singapore, Spain, and the USA. In the Business Unit Information MATERNA implements integrated, comprehensive IT solutions for process optimisation in companies and public administrations. Among these number the fields of business service management, customer service and support, business portals and content management as well as e-Government. The Business Unit Communications provides products and solutions for the business fields of mobile solutions and unified messaging. In particular, these are mobile added value services and services for fixed networks on the basis of SMS, MMS, WAP and mobile Java, which are sold under the name of Anny Way. The Anny Way academy is also active on the market with practical training and consulting services.
Further information from:
MATERNA Information & Communications
Public Relations
Vosskuhle 37, 44141 Dortmund, Germany
Business Unit Information Business Unit Communications
Christine Siepe Antje Krämer
Phone +49 231/55 99-1 68 Tel. +49 231/55 99-83 96
E-Mail: 
christine.siepe@materna.de E-Mail: antje.kraemer@materna.de
www.materna.com www.annyway.de
