Cape Town-headquartered Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) startup Magnetic Software has launched in Australia after closing an exclusive distribution agreement with Perth-based Titan Digital.
Magnetic was founded in 2012, creating an all-in-one solution for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and advertising and digital agencies to manage their business processes. It provides a cloud-based SaaS platform focusing on sales, CRM, project management, accounts and human resources.
After closing two funding rounds in the last twelve months, Magnetic is expanding beyond South Africa. Disrupt Africa reported in January the startup was planning a United States (US) launch by the middle of this year, but it has first made inroads in Australia through the agreement with Titan, the largest digital agency in Western Australia.
“This partnership will aid in our global expansion and rapidly ramp up our client base across Australia and the UK, while we continue building partnerships in the US. Titan will take on a sales distribution and training role, marketing and selling Magnetic to agencies and SMEs across Australia, New Zealand and the UK,” chief executive officer (CEO) Daniel Marcus, who runs the business alongside co-founders Korak Kuhnert and Jan Pickard, told Disrupt Africa.
Marcus said the partnership would help Magnetic reach its goal of 10,000 users by the end of 2017.
“The SME market in Australia is huge and switched on when it comes to SaaS for small businesses. We’ve always had our eye on it, and have been looking for the right partner to help us access the market there,” he said.
Wayne Hughes, Titan Digital managing director in Australia, said the company was excited to be a customer implementing Magnetic as a valuable tool to streamline its growing organisation.
“This level of faith in Magnetic has enabled Titan Digital to confidently be a strategic partner and to offer the product out to assist our 2,000-plus growing clients to better utilise their resources with the help of Magnetic,” he said.
Marcus said Magnetic had also managed a number of big client wins recently, notably Hero, Artifact, Stretch Experiential, Positive Dialogue, Primedia, ROI Media and New Media Labs.
“In just over a year we have grown to over 100 paying companies with an average of 15 users per company,” he said.
The startup charges a per user per month subscription fee of US$20, and reports a six-fold increase in revenues since January 2014.
“We built Magnetic due to our frustration of not being able to manage our business in one simple to use platform. There was no single cost effective solution for SMEs. Most of our competitors focus on single verticals, such as sales and project management,” Marcus said.
“We built Magnetic for SMEs to help them become more efficient and to give business owners a bird’s eye view into their businesses from anywhere at any time.”
