English Micro Focus initiates its operations in Brazil
Valor Econômico
A manifest. Beside entrepreneurs and local leaderships, English Stephen Kelly, head executive of the Micro Focus software company, publicly announced the launching of a movement with the purpose of banishing the apathy that has dominated the economy of the United Kingdom this week. Saying out loud "Making Britain Great Again", Kelly guaranteed that, if everybody works for the same purpose, the technological industry of England may generate 250 thousand new job positions in eight to ten years' time.
Despite the fervor of his political speech, Stephen Kelly really seems engaged in expanding the operations of its Micro Focus, even to destinations which are very far from the United Kingdom. The English company has just started its operations in Brazil. The arrival in Latin America happens with the simultaneous opening of a branch office in Mexico. In Brazil, Micro Focus will be headed by Marco Leone. Micro Focus is owner of a software family that helps developers of systems to update the technological environment of companies.
More than by the opening of subsidiaries, Micro Focus has been expanding its operations by means of acquisitions. Last month, the company made an R$ 88 million proposal for the acquisition of the American Borland. The transaction still depends on the approval of the directors of the companies, but everything leads to the conclusion of the business within the next days. In May, the English company bought the test division of applications of also the American Compuware, by US$ 80 million. The size of the acquisitions is considerable, mainly if compared with the current size of Micro Focus itself. In its 2009 fiscal year, ended April 30, the company registered an income of US$ 274 million, a 20% growth compared to the US$ 228.2 million it made in the previous year. Both Borland and Compuware already had operations in Brazil before Micro Focus decided it would come to the country.
With nearly 1.5 thousand employees worldwide, Micro Focus has an eye on the market of systems update that run in servers and mainframes, the supercomputers used by Federal Government agencies and by most of the banks of the country. In the future, however, it will have to face the heavy competition of companies like IBM and HP, two heavy weights of this sector.