Success Story of HACSNET in Greece

HACSNET is the first company in Greece that focuses mainly on delivering Outsourcing Services to the Small and Medium Business market. HACSNET is founded in April 2006 as a result of a merge/acquisition of three services companies that were delivering accounting, networking and IT security services respectively. All shareholders are experienced individuals and their analysis and assessment of conditions in the Greek Market convinced them that there was a viable opportunity for a company specializing in delivering Outsourcing Services.

During these 20 months we had the privilege to experience in many cases how much the need of an Outsourcing company in Greece was. We serve now over 170 companies and professionals covering several different services areas with over 2.100 workstations. The most successful case was the absolutely 100% successful restore of a Client’ data after a robbery at their offices almost a month ago. We immediately reacted by ordering and delivering in less than 48 hours new hardware (seven workstations and one small server) and restored all Client’ data using AREBAS – our branded version of Ahsay™ ’s All-in-one AhsayOBM. As a result, our Client, who is one of the two largest advertising companies in Greece, gold partner of Leo Barnett, Coca Cola and Marlboro was very satisfied and posted announcements on the country’s largest newspaper, called NAFTEMPORIKI. That was a huge reference and advertise for us and since then we have seen a remarkable raise of interest on our Backup Solution.

The market for providing this service in Greek Mid-Market Business is fragmented and no company has yet acquired identifiable market share. However we believe we are the most recognizable backup solution provider since we have implemented our solution to very important companies in Greece, like the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Transport, the largest retail company of HOME APPLIANCES in Greece (52 sites) called ELECTRONIKI ATHINON (win back from VERITAS!), the local AUDI and VW major distributor, and many professionals and Greek Mid-Market companies.

We only started our relationship with Ahsay™ one year ago by introducing AREBAS to the Greek Market. Now that the second year of relationship starts we aim to establish much stronger the solution to the market, targeting to inform EVERY single Greek Business and professional.

When HACSNET was founded 20 months ago, the provision of a Backup Solution was of equal importance to the other solutions we were designing regarding Accounting, Networking etc. Now, we have re-organized our company by creating a separate Line of Business for AREBAS having targeted to dominate in Greek SMB. Easy to understand, Ahsay™ ’s products are of crucial and strategic importance for HACSNET. Therefore our Board of Directors decided to invest almost 500K Euros on AREBAS, 19 times more that the initial approved fund 20 months ago!

We believe that Ahsay™ ’s products and services have three major characteristics: The solution is 100% integrated and complete, comes to a very attractive value for money and the support is very fast and focused to solving the problem and serving the client or the partner. The above were the main reasons while we decided to cooperate with Ahsay™ rather to some other provider. And if it was to evaluate again, we would again choose Ahsay™ ’s products and services.

As already stated above, the solution is 100% integrated and complete, comes to a very attractive value for money and the support is very fast and focused to solving the problem and serving the client or the partner. Other solutions in the local and global market have major difficulties in encryption and in support.

We have implemented our solution to very important companies in Greece, like the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Transport, the largest retail company of HOME APPLIANCES in Greece (52 sites) called ELECTRONIKI ATHINON, the local AUDI and VW major distributor, and many professionals and Greek Mid-Market companies. So we could state that up to now we have customers of several Business Areas. That is one of our major advantages that we can apply to everyone, our Business Structure allows us to do so. Added to this, we have already released AREBAS User Guides in Greek and English language, and two Greek brochures inspired from Ahsay™ ’s brochures. The respective links for your reference are:

HACSNET is at this point implementing a very critical business project with two major axes: First, we are finishing by the end of December 2007 the implementation of three major Business Continuity sites with clustered AREBAS Servers around Athens (please see attached satellite picture called AREBAS SERVERS MAP. On parallel, we have started to present AREBAS to major local integrators in large Greece cities proposing AREBAS partnerships. Our target is to sign partner agreements in the five largest Greek cities (apart from Athens where we already have three significant partners) by the end of the 1Q 2008. We have a very pressing project plan to create a very strong partner network all over the country to deliver AREBAS services to over 10.000 workstations by the end of 2009.

The major difficulties we have come up with have to do with various confidentiality issues. The only way to tackle them is through discussion and through signing a contract where we clearly state that we cannot monitor their online communications neither will edit nor remove their content without their written permission etc.

First of all, we have to state that working with Ahsay™ is really a pleasure. Ahsay™ as a company behaves very clear and very up to the point and that way it avoids misunderstandings and makes business very easy for all. Our board has taken a decision to support Ahsay™ ’s business in Greece and Cyprus at a significant financial cost by requesting the privilege of becoming the local Exclusive Distributor. To cut the long story short, we believe that Ahsay™ should centralize administration by assigning local Exclusive Distributors – and focus on supporting mainly them directly. These Exclusive Distributors should have the responsibility of organizing and supporting local Partners Networks. That way, the whole Partner Network will become stronger since its ‘roots’ – even the smallest Partner - will strengthen by enjoying closer local support.

Online Backup itself as a Service has a very broad coverage capability. It applies to everyone, is worldwide and therefore the opportunities in online backup industry seem endless. We strongly believe that this is the new IT trend for the next decade and our decision to invest in online backup industry proves it.

As already stated, HACSNET believes that the way Ahsay™ is investing on the relationship and cooperation with its partners is very professional and towards this direction we should all together fight for the common good. However, more sales material (like CD boxes, branded User Guides) and centralized localization are a couple of actions that could help more.

The basic thing that comes to mind is financial and has to do with allowing charges directly in USD or EUR instead of only HKD. Banks in Greece do not yet serve transactions in HKD and we are therefore obliged to charge our credit card which is legally not recommended in Greece.