EFI supports IVE Group with efficiencies through technology smarts: Matt Aitken

A 100-year old Australian holistic marketing company, IVE Group has always kept a keen eye on technology and innovation to not only improve its efficiencies but also offer the best of services to its clients.

The company’s CEO Matt Aitken joined EFI chief revenue officer and senior vice-president of worldwide sales and marketing Frank Mallozzi at an EFI Engage virtual customer panel to talk through the business’ transition with technology and innovation.

With a long-standing relationship with EFI, Aitken said IVE Group had initially invested in legacy systems to manage processes and has continued on these investments as the business’ needs evolved.

“Historically, we’ve had a partnership with EFI through the Prism platform. Prism has been the background of our business for 20 years from a MIS and ERP level. It served us very well through that time, and continues to serve parts of our business well today,” Aitken said.  

“We went on a journey to make the whole business fit into Prism using different Prism installs. Whilst doing that, we found that while you do get some efficiencies, you also don’t get absolute tailorability to that particular business’ requirements because you make some compromises along the way, or you don’t get the specific outcomes that business unit might need from having an entire business operating from one MIS or ERP system.”

As the IVE Group progressed with 26 acquisitions since 2013, it diversified its offerings into four divisions – creative services, data-driven communications, production and distribution, and integrated marketing – and determined that a rethink of its processes was necessary.

“From our group’s perspective, we’re always looking at how we can continue to diversify and ensure that our strategy is aligned with what our clients’ needs,” he said.  

“What we’ve done over the last three years is rethought our processes as we’ve gone through acquisitions and integrations. We’ve looked at new technologies in the market, including technologies from EFI like Pace and Technique.

“As we’ve reorganised our business, we realised that we need to arm our business with platforms and workflow technology that enables our clients to be the best in the sectors that they play in.

“In the last two years, we’ve migrated some parts of our business, in particular our retail display business, away from Prism and onto the Pace platform. We have also taken our web printing business that was running out of Prism onto Technique – we now have three web printing parts in Australia all operating off the same Technique platform.

“This has allowed us to drive efficiencies in our business using the new platforms. We’re constantly looking to investments to help us drive our business forward.”

One of the things on the horizon for IVE, according to Aitken, is within the point of sale printing and sign and display market.

“In Australia, over the last six years, we were one of the firsts in the market to bring the VUTEk HS100 into the market. We now have four hybrid HS100s or 125s in this market, along with a VUTEk 5r. They serve us really well in that point of sale and display space,” he said.

“We have duplication or replication to produce national campaigns or disaster recovery if needed. But, we also know that many plants still run litho or laminate point of sale and display processes today so what’s of real interest to us in terms of technology evolution and upgrades is, at what point in time do vendors like EFI (I know EFI has plans) start to bring technology into the market that can genuinely replace those litho/laminate processes in the display production process.

“When I say ‘genuinely’, I mean at a quality level and a total cost level. Vendors like EFI are making deep inroads into creating those solutions. As we look at our next 24 months, part of our investment cycle will be in that point of sale and production space.”

According to Aitken, it is dangerous for print service providers to sit on the fence in terms of their investment in new solutions, especially if a sector is in decline.

“This is because those revenue streams will get away from you unless you do something different on a technology level. So, we should constantly be looking to innovations and investment opportunities to keep bringing new ideas to the table for clients or to be more efficient in terms of how we operate.”

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