UNIT4 : acquires French education management solution

Sliedrecht, The Netherlands, 04 September 2013 - UNIT4, the global leader in software that supports business change, today announced the acquisition of Unify Portal, a French education management software solution, to support its aim to become the software vendor of choice for global education and research institutions.

Unify Education's portal technology, built on UNIT4's Agresso Education software, will be used to provide enhanced functionality to its robust self-service portal, a key component in its global education offering. It offers user friendly, ergonomic and efficient access to the heart of the education management system for each of the constituents who contribute to the academic fabric of an institution.

"Students, faculty and staff are demanding better service from their institutions, and they expect to perform services online," said David Turner, Group Marketing Director, UNIT4. "They expect access to information at the touch of a button. This is driving institutions to let users perform more tasks online and remotely to suit their schedules. We aim to help institutions provide their students and staff with the tools they need to manage daily tasks successfully and to provide an integrated, online student experience from the moment they first enquire or apply through to enrolling onto their chosen program and throughout their time at the institution."

The acquisition gives UNIT4 ownership over a joint development initiative with Unify Education which extended the software functionality to meet the needs of institutions and their students. The solution provides an intranet for the administrative team and an extranet for students, teachers, companies and parents. This will be integral to UNIT4's new Education and Research solution, UNIT4 Campus, designed to exploit the unique change capabilities of the UNIT4 Agresso Development Platform. UNIT4's new Flexible Service Delivery methodology ensures it is well suited to a shared services environment and cloud delivery, and will allow institutions the option to adopt the solution in a modular fashion, linking it via web services to existing legacy systems until they are replaced. 

UNIT4 already provides software solutions to more than 400 Education and Research institutions, making it the leading supplier to the sector in the UK and Scandinavia, with an emerging presence in North America, France and other countries worldwide. In 2012 it established a global Centre of Excellence for Education and Research solutions where it is combining its extensive domain expertise with the post-implementation change capabilities of the UNIT4 Agresso Development Platform. The new enterprise solution, UNIT4 Campus, will better meet the needs of institutions than non-integrated, antiquated competitive offerings. This is particularly true for institutions opening international campuses and research centers, partnering with institutions abroad or actively seeking to attract international students.

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About UNIT4

UNIT4 is a global cloud-focused business software company aimed at helping dynamic public sector and commercial services organizations to embrace change simply, quickly and cost effectively. The Group incorporates a number of the world's leading change embracing software brands including Agresso, our flagship ERP suite for mid-sized and large services intensive organizations; Coda, our best-of-class financial management software; and FinancialForce.com, the cloud applications company formed with investment from salesforce.com.

With operations in 26 countries worldwide, revenue of €469.8 million was realised in 2012. UNIT4 is headquartered in Sliedrecht, the Netherlands and has over 4,000 employees. It is listed on Euronext Amsterdam by NYSE Euronext and is included in the Amsterdam Midcap Index (AMX). For more information on UNIT4 or any of its operating companies, please visit the website at http://www.unit.com, follow us on Twitter @UNIT4_Group or visit our Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/UNIT4BusinessSoftwareNV

Emma Keates

Group PR Manager, UNIT4

+44 (0)1423 537977

emma.keates@unit4.com

About Unify Education

Unify Education is a company dedicated to the Higher Education sector which provides a global information system combined with a process oriented methodology and constant innovation to allow schools to overcome real challenges against worldwide competition.www.unify-education.com