As Poslovni Dnevnik/Josipa Ban writes, the Virovitica IT company Factory, which recently celebrated its 10th anniversary, has recently announced some rather ambitious plans. They want to be the leader, that is, in the top five companies that develop solutions based on Pimcore technology in the world. Ivica Horvat, one of the owners and director of Factory, discussed the topic.
Their plans, he says, are very realistic because in just four years, since they focused their business on Pimcore technology, they managed to position themselves among the leading 20. This is the result of top quality work and the fact that they successfully implemented the technology that enables the digital transformation of the company. They’ve done the same for 150 clients.
Most of the Virovitica IT company Factory’s clients are foreign companies, primarily from the DACH (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) region, the USA and Great Britain, meaning that a massive 80 percent of their income is generated on foreign markets. Their good business is continually confirmed by the constant growth of income, which rose to an impressive 8.8 million kuna last year.
This year, however, they expect to earn about 10 million kuna, which means a continuation of the trend of revenue growth. When they started their business back in 2012, under the name Plava tvornica (Blue factory), their business focus was completely different. They developed, as Horvat recalls, websites and mobile applications (apps).
“When we started the business, we took every single job we could get our hands on and we adapted to each client. After some time, we realised that it’s so difficult to develop the company because we were just going in too many directions. We decided on a detour, but it was far from simple. We had to overcome a certain fear and uncertainty that comes with undergoing changes,” explains Horvat, adding that the business environment ten years ago, when they were one of the first IT companies in all of Virovitica, was a lot different than it is today.
“The ecosystem wasn’t developed then. We started in an environment where you had to learn on your own and you pay for everything out of your own pocket, and even the small IT community itself at the time was much more closed off,” he said, adding that starting an IT company in Croatia is much, much easier today.
“Today, the exchange of information is completely open. I’m proud to be part of a community that is ready to share all of their knowledge and experience”, said the Virovitica IT company Factory, which is now a company that currently has three offices – in Virovitica, Osijek and across the pond in San Francisco.
Factory matured alongside the IT sector in Croatia, and it turned from a company that “made everything” into a company that makes specialised solutions for its clients, including engaging in consulting services. The specialised solution is the implementation of Pimcore technology, which, as Horvat explained, enables the centralisation and management of all types of data.
“It is used by companies that manage large amounts of data and which need to distribute it to different points. On the Pimcore platform, we work with end-to-end solutions that enable the collection, processing, storage and distribution of data about products, services or any other digital materials within the company,” he explained, noting that the platform, in addition to enabling the digital transformation of the company, does the same and is more competitive.
It’s worth noting that in addition to technical assistance in the introduction of Pimcore, Factory has also recently been offering consulting services through the Consulting Department, which currently employs two people and should have four employees by the end of the year.
“We want to be a company that, in addition to developing technological solutions, also offers consulting services to clients regarding the implementation of digital processes and tools in the company,” Horvat stated.
The number of employees in this department should be doubled over the next year, which means that much like others, the Virovitica IT company Factory is also facing an increasingly challenging search for employees, in this case – IT experts. That problem, at least according to Horvat, isn’t just specific to Croatia but to the whole world.
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