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Atturra now a market leader in QAD ERP solutions with latest acquisition
Wed, 2nd Mar 2022
FYI, this story is more than a year old

Advisory and technology solutions provider Atturra has announced the acquisition of Kettering Professional Services, a Brisbane-headquartered specialist ERP solutions provider focusing on local manufacturing.

Kettering implements and manages QAD ERP solutions. It provides a full spectrum of services around QAD's product range and ecosystem. Founded in 1979, QAD serves customers in over 100 countries manufacturing ERP software. Thoma Bravo recently acquired the company at an equity value of approximately US$2 billion.

Kettering has been the sole QAD partner in Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji. This acquisition will now result in Atturra being a market leader in QAD ERP solutions in Australia and increasing its manufacturing client base to over 50 organisations.

With an upfront consideration of $3M and up to $2.25M in deferred consideration, the purchase price reflects a 4.05 multiple calculated by reference to achieving all the deferred consideration milestones. The deferred consideration is structured into milestone earn outs for each financial year until FY24. Kettering says it anticipates adding incremental revenue of $1.6m and EBIT of $0.18m to the Atturra FY22 full-year results.

"It's great to welcome Kettering to the Atturra business. Kettering is a great fit both strategically and culturally," says Atturra chief executive officer, Stephen Kowal.

"Atturra is passionate about building sovereign capabilities and ensuring that our clients, whether they are in the public or private sector, have a genuine local option. Atturra will now have over 50 manufacturing clients and is the Australian market leader in QAD services. Atturra is also well positioned to become the advisory and IT solutions provider of choice for the manufacturing sector."

He says the partnership between QAD and Boomi also provide additional opportunities for Atturra, as it is already the domestic leader in Boomi services. "This allows us to service Kettering's existing client base and any new clients even better."

Rob Cheesman, founder and current CEO of Kettering, says, "Kettering and Atturra share a vision to optimise manufacturers' operations while freeing teams to focus on strategic aspects of the business.

"Kettering's expertise combined with QAD solutions meets a need for enterprise resource planning excellence that is highly complementary to Atturra's comprehensive consulting services and existing technology solutions. Joining forces with Atturra gives us the best of both worlds, a highly skilled team focused on manufacturing with the backing of a greatly respected Australian public company.

"Having such a strong cultural fit with Atturra, I know our staff and clients will get this benefit in full," he adds.

Kettering Professional Services is a consulting firm focused on providing manufacturing organisations business process and technology solutions.

Our speciality is ERP for manufacturing organisations," says Cheesman. "Since we started business in 2005, we have been the sole QAD operating partner in Australia and Fiji, later for New Zealand. We believe QAD's singular commitment to manufacturing makes it the ideal partner to support our clients."

Founded in 1979 and headquartered in Santa Barbara, California, QAD has 30 offices globally. Over 2,000 manufacturing companies have deployed QAD solutions, including enterprise resource planning (ERP), digital supply chain planning (DSCP), global trade and transportation execution (GTTE), quality management system (QMS) and strategic sourcing and supplier management.