Our story began two decades ago, when SAGE established its corporate presence in Newcastle upon Tyne in northern England. A clear business vision and targeted market strategies for the small-to medium–sized business community resulted in early success. By 1989 The Sage Group plc was offered on the London Stock Exchange, and had quickly assumed a position of leadership in the accounting software industry.

Growing Up Fast

Expansion efforts bore fruit just a few years later, when Sage acquired a number of respected software firms like Ciel SA in France and Timeslips in the United States. Subsequent acquisitions read like a Who’s Who of the world’s most preeminent accounting packages including recent acquisitions of AccPac and Simply Accounting, as illustrated on the following pages.

Charting the Course

How was The Sage Group plc able to achieve market dominance so swiftly and effectively? By providing the business insights our customers need for success, including:

Comprehensive line of quality products—innovative, integrated, sophisticated software that provides insights behind the numbers—whenever you need it—presented easily and clearly.

Superior customer services–offered both by SAGE staff members, online customer services and our hand-selected network of value-added resellers.

Web savvy and technological vision–with a future focus that will ensure SAGE stays on the crest of the next technology wave, we continue to investigate and evaluate all new technologies as they become available. This in turn helps our customers to stay ahead of their competition and maintain their leadership position in the e-business marketplace.

We take great satisfaction in being the world’s leading supplier of business management and accounting software systems.

BusinessWeek ranked The SAGE Group plc among the top ten international software companies, along with giants like Microsoft, Oracle and Adobe. The report also named SAGE as one of the world’s 1,000 most valuable firms.

Best in America— from Coast to Coast Leadership

"What I find remarkable about SAGE MAS 90 is that its upgrades are so well integrated. As a result, Hansen’s has been able to grow efficiently with MAS 90 in place for an entire decade." Tom Kelly, Controller Hansen Natural Corporation Corona, California Manufacturer and marketer of natural beverages

For over 20 years, SAGE has been pioneering computer-based solutions for an important niche market—business management and accounting applications for growing companies. Through dedicated, customer-centric efforts, our award-winning products and end-to-end services have earned the attention of consumers and investors alike. Today, SAGE Software enjoys a commanding presence across the nation among software providers that specialize in business management for small and mid-range firms.

Comprehensive Product Line-Up

A rich diversity of product offerings ensures that SAGE customers receive the information they need in critical areas of business, and that the information is delivered with clarity and focus for the success and growth of their companies. The product breadth, scalability and flexibility makes certain your system can expand as your business grows—from entry-level to enterprise solutions.

MAS 500 —A robust series of applications for larger companies with up to 1,000 employees and $25 million to more than $250 million in revenues. Advanced distribution capabilities to maximize inventory, an out-of-the-box e-commerce solution, award-winning integration hooks to popular third-party applications, and an authentic customization suite for cost-effective and efficient application development all represent one of the most reliable, flexible and full-featured business management solutions. SAGE MAS 90 - Sage 100 Standard—The undisputed market leader for medium-sized firms with 10 to 200 employees, SAGE MAS 90 provides full-featured accounting, distribution, manufacturing, e-commerce, and industry-specific Windows applications, with 28 modules available. SAGE MAS 200 - Sage 100 Advanced and Premium (SQL)— SAGE MAS 200 offers all the performance features of SAGE MAS 90, the power to handle higher transaction volumes, thin-client architecture, and a choice of database platforms, including Microsoft SQL Server, in a networked environment. SAGE BusinessWorks Gold —This dynamic accounting solution was designed specifically for small emerging companies up to 20 employees who have outgrown off-the-shelf bookkeeping packages. It features 11 fully integrated modules, plus extensive reporting tools, all simple to use and easy to learn with the same functionality as packages costing thousands more. SAGE DacEasy —When smaller businesses want a streamlined core accounting and payroll package, SAGE DacEasy is a logical answer, with intuitive user interfaces and popular reports that have satisfied customers for years. Peachtree Software —Companies with less than 20 employees find the accounting features they need in Peachtree, an easy-to-learn and easy-to-use set of products—available in retail stores only as entry-level, off-the-shelf solutions that interface with Microsoft Excel. Abra Suite —Abra Suite, the market leading human resource package in the U.S., offers complete payroll processing, recruiting, training, and benefits administration. FAS —FAS fixed asset management solutions can help financial managers streamline everything from very basic to extremely complex asset management tasks.

A World of Experience

In this era of global commerce, choosing a software provider with an international perspective is essential. The Sage Group plc understands both the complexities and possibilities that continue to evolve, thanks to dynamic advances in technology. Proof lies in the scope of our own operations.

The United Kingdom is home to 300,000 SAGE customers—and our corporate headquarters.

North America is SAGE country, where 1,300,000 customers rely on SAGE accounting and Internet solutions. Profitability is up 24 percent over last year.

Caribbean customers turn to SAGE distributors in Guadeloupe, Guyana and Martinique.

Asia and the Pacific are served by SAGE distributors in Australia, Brunei, French Polynesia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Thailand.

Germany has more than 250,000 satisfied SAGE customers.

Middle East customers find SAGE in the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon.

European customers are served by SAGE subsidiaries and distributors in Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Gibraltar, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal Spain and Switzerland.

France has 350,000 SAGE customers.

African businesses count on SAGE in Benin, Cameroon, Gabon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mayotte, Morocco, Nigeria, Reunion, Senegal, South Africa, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda and Zambia.

Worldwide more than 2 million customers trust SAGE for sophisticated yet easy-to-use accounting and business management packages.

Strength In Numbers

The Sage Group plc boasts annual revenues of about $600 million and 5,000 employees worldwide. Our market capitalization is an imposing $8.0 billion. This presence translates into significant benefits for millions of people in our customer base, and the 26,000 resellers who provide them with consulting and support services.

Customer Care—Our Competitive Edge

“MAS 500 has dramatically increased the efficiency of our accounting processes. It didn’t take any time at all for the implementers to figure out our business model. They understood the various features we needed and were very creative in setting up a system that would really work.” John Adams,Controller Fiera.com Miami, Florida E-commerce to Spanish and Portuguese language markets worldwide

All SAGE products are backed by world-class support services, which include comprehensive technical support and award-winning online customer services. We know that superior-quality support ultimately distinguishes us from all other providers, and at SAGE, customer satisfaction is our hallmark. As a result, we continue to invest heavily in staffing, training and leading-edge technology.

Technical Support That Wins Awards

SAGE is deeply committed to ensuring total customer satisfaction through world-class phone support. In fact, our friendly and responsive customer support team has earned the prestigious STAR (Software Technical Assistance Recognition) Award for customer support over the past four years in various categories, including back-to- back honors for Sustained Performance. SAGE is also ranked among the top one percent of all support organizations by the Support Center Practices Program—further evidence of our commitment to customers. It all adds up to fast accurate answers that raise your performance to new heights.

SAGE Software Awards

Online Support That’s Ahead Of The Game

The Internet, when at its best, serves as a tool that saves time and money. To that end, SAGE has built an award-winning online support system that provides fast, reliable answers to thousands of common and not-so-common software questions. SAGE Online Customer Services (BOCS) contains the very same database used by our internal software analysts. This gives our customers a great return on investment because they can deal with technical issues on their own, without the need for hiring expensive software consultants.

Electronic Messaging is an often under-utilized communications tool within the business world. But at SAGE, we've taken electronic messaging to a new level. Our online chat rooms and SAGETalk discussion forums put you in contact with SAGE experts and other SAGE customers so you can learn how to improve your software’s power and expand it to better suit your needs. Plus you can sign up for proactive electronic notifications that keep your company and your software a step ahead. These periodic messages contain technical bulletins, product updates and enhancements that prevent difficulties before they happen and maintain the reliability of the software. It’s another way that we help keep your SAGE system running smoothly.

Web-Savvy Strategies

SAGE is rolling out a new set of Web-based applications for access to e-commerce and e-business management services, which will soon be available online to current customers. The first of our proprietary tools, SAGE SiteCreator, walks customers through the steps of building their own Web site and opening the doors of their new Web “store,” making it easy for customers to start up a credible e-business presence.

"We’ve really been strapped for staff members as we grow. Fortunately, we seem to be a lot bigger than we are. To achieve this, we had to use technology to maximum advantage, to create and maintain an appropriate presence in the marketplace. SAGE MAS 90 with its e-Business Manager module played a major role in allowing us to do this. “ Kurt L. Peterson, Vice President of Finance Oregon Chai Portland, Oregon Beverage manufacturer and distributor

SAGE has always been ahead of the pack when it comes to proactive business solutions. So naturally we are one of the first in the industry to develop the insightful Web tools our customers need to maximize e-business opportunities. We now offer a comprehensive array of e-business management products and related services, including e-commerce applications, Web-enabled desktop software, online support services, and Application Service Provider (ASP) solutions.

Internet Integration

E-commerce is quickly becoming a must-have for ambitious companies looking to conduct business online. SAGE understands this, and many of our products are Web-ready, with embedded Internet functionality or access to third-party services. Our top-selling products are available with e-business module options. Many of these options provide programming that flows online transaction data from a Web storefront to the core business management and accounting applications— eliminating double entry and potential for errors, updating inventory turns, and allowing your business to stay open 24 hours a day-seven days a week.

SAGE Online Customer Services

As a benefit of our customer support plans, SAGE provides access to the award-winning SAGE Online Customer Services (SOCS) Web site. Here, customers can obtain useful tips on their software, post questions to other customers, download product upgrades and updates—24 hours a day, seven days a week. SOCS enables customers to quickly find answers to their questions through access to our vast database of support case experiences.

A Host of Possibilities

With the Internet becoming an accepted vehicle to deploy business computing products, SAGE has already arranged for its most popular product lines to be delivered as hosted applications using Application Service Providers (ASPs). We have developed partnerships with reliable Asps, including IBM, that offer the expertise to host SAGE software on their servers, ensuring security of data and making the software available for companies who don’t want to allocate the large budgets to implement and maintain a robust software system.

The Best is Yet to come

"Although installing MAS 500 is simple, we couldn’t have achieved such great results without our reseller. Their support ensured that we had full ODBC connectivity to a legacy system, which was no easy task. In addition, they figured out how to convert data from our old system, something that was almost impossible. And, they did it on schedule." Clayton Conrad, IS Manager Advantest America R&D Center, Inc. (ARD) Santa Clara, California Research and development of automatic test equipment for semiconductor industry

SAGE is continuing to expand our offerings to meet the challenges in today’s ever-changing business climate. Every year we strive to create new products, enhancements and offer a variety of vertical market solutions, while simultaneously adding entire product lines and growing revenues, profitability and staff.

However, this is only a fraction of the attention we pay to our customers. Our ongoing efforts begin with strong products and a commitment to customer satisfaction. Our strategic focus rests on striking a balance between understanding our customers’ needs and desires, or functionality improvements, and introducing new, innovative technologies to keep you competitive.

Product strength—With such a strong family of products available on industry-leading platforms and highly skilled channel partners available to assist you, SAGE is raising the bar on what customers can expect from powerful business management and accounting solutions. What’s more, SAGE endeavors to sustain and support the growth of your business by providing comprehensive intelligence that penetrates your raw data and reveals ways to increase effectiveness through higher productivity and better decision making. At all stages of growth, our products offer benefits like:

Streamlined analysis and business alerts, which provide insights behind the numbers by integrating your data and presenting it easily and clearly.

Integrations to connect your lines of information crucial to understanding cause and effect.

Customizable systems for independent businesses who require the flexibility of making their own operations more efficient and reducing the costs of hiring outside programmers.

Understanding our customer—The business world is changing so rapidly that it’s essential to keep up on market trends and listen to our customers with great sensitivity. This commitment to customer satisfaction drives our business, so we can continue to meet both the existing and emerging needs of our clients. The results include delivering functionality enhancements that make our systems easy to use, and regular releases of new productivity-enhancing applications. This dedication to our customers is backed by award-winning support services and a nationwide network of certified resellers.

Technological innovation—The vision spurring SAGE’s most recent product releases rests in a philosophy of connecting business. With more connectivity or integrations, our customers can gain greater insights from all areas of their business, and increase productivity. Recently, our focus for connecting business has centered on front office solutions, such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM), e-business capabilities, and other effective applications. Connecting these front office solutions to SAGE’s industry-leading core back office operations of accounting, distribution and inventory, provides customers with a single interface to leverage your entire system. The benefit is a comprehensive line of innovative business software that provides insights behind the numbers—whenever you need it—presented easily and clearly.

We’ll provide more business insights for customers by connecting them with clients using CRM integrations, connecting their employees through Web-enabled human resources, and connecting them to their supply chain— again, with an integration to back office applications. This strategy yields the potential for vastly improving customer satisfaction, breaking down geographical barriers, and linking suppliers to customers for seamless document exchange. Although these efforts are complex and will take time to fully develop, SAGE is confident they will provide the most significant and long-lasting improvements to the way your business operates.