Easymeeting planning to extend
relationships beyond UK funder/broker Syscap.
Go deeper with GlobalData
A new video conferencing provider
with experience of sales aid leasing in Scandinavia has set its
sights on growth in the UK, using leasing to pursue a greater share
of the SME market.
Easymeeting, a joint venture between Norwegian
video conferencing provider Avikom and British reseller and
installer Quest Mark, was founded in 2009 with the intention of
introducing video conferencing in the SME sector.
Video conferencing in the UK has seen a much
greater uptake by large corporate and public sector customers than
by SMEs.
However, Kevin O’Shea, Easymeeting’s head of
EMEA business development, believes there is great potential for
smaller businesses to take up the technology.
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By GlobalData
One strategy
for encouraging them to do so will be to lower the barrier on
capital investment by offering systems on a leasing option with
packages comprising hardware, broadband connectivity and
installation and support services.
Whereas Questmark has little experience of
selling video conference systems through a leasing model, Avikom
has used the strategy in Scandinavia to maintain regular sales
growth over the past few years.
So far, Easymeeting has undertaken several
initial leasing sales through Syscap, the technology led introducer
and funding provider. The relationship came about due to Syscap’s
existing financing relationship with Imago Group Plc, one of
Easymeeting’s equipment suppliers.
However, O’Shea says that the company is
looking to broaden its range of leasing partners as business picks
up.
Back in the Nordics, Easymeeting has recently
partnered with two leading office equipment manufacturers. Both
companies are said to be well-known for selling primarily through
leasing, and have their own well-developed captive finance
companies, although the parent companies have not yet been
named.
The SME customer base of these companies
overlaps with that targeted by Easymeeting, said the company,
providing an opportunity for cross-selling to a market already
receptive to the idea of purchase through leasing.
O’Shea commented: “We want to make video
communications an integral part of everyday business, and to do
that we’ve got to make it easy for people to have access to this
form of communication.
“The equipment is available to SMEs as a
leasing package rather than through outright purchase. It makes it
easier for them, because most SMEs will buy some form of
communications on a lease with a fixed monthly cost rather than a
large sum of money.”
• Easymeeting is a holding company created
to take in video conferencing providers Avikom and Quest Mark as
subsidiaries. Avikom has 32 employees in Norway, two in Sweden and
four in Denmark, while Quest Mark has 22 in the UK. Avikom head
Hans Johan Tofteng met Sam McMaster, managing director of Quest
Mark, in 2005, since when the two firms have worked closely
together.
Fred Crawley
