Double-digit sales increase at Abacus Research AG

With another double-digit increase in sales, Abacus confirms its leading position as a manufacturer of business software for SMEs and public administration in 2020. The traditional licensing business, in which software is purchased, has remained at a consistently high level, with over 2,400 program modules sold and 460 companies choosing Abacus Business Software, according to the company. This compares to 2,200 program modules and 450 companies in 2019. Subscriptions for use from the cloud have met with great demand thanks to innovative developments. This solution, with 3,100 subscriptions added by the end of the year, already counted more than 13,800 users who use 24,000 program subscriptions for various application areas.

Self-service functions meet with acceptance

Self-service functions were also very well received, with an additional 60,000 subscriptions, an increase of fifty percent. They are tailored to the needs of company employees and allow them to adjust master data such as address and bank details themselves, view pay slips or record expense receipts, working hours, absences and benefits from any location using smartphones, tablets and computers. As of the end of 2020, 180,000 users were using these functions of the Abacus software.

Increase in sales enables voluntary repayment of short-time working compensation

Claudio Hintermann, CEO of Abacus, is therefore more than satisfied with last year's business performance: "Contrary to expectations, we ended the year extremely successfully despite the difficult economic environment due to the rampant pandemic. As a result, we decided to voluntarily refund to the state all short-time working compensation of over 1.3 million Swiss francs received. Also, no salary reductions were made due to the interrupted working hours. The short-time work at Abacus lasted from May to August and applied to practically all employees with only a few exceptions. A big thank you goes to our distribution partners, who had a significant impact on the very good result despite the difficult Corona period."

Successful sales partners

Abacus' largest distribution partner in 2020 in terms of total sales was, as in 2019, the Axept Business Softwarefollowed by BDO and OBT. The most successful provider of software subscriptions for the mobile use of Abacus software and the use of the ERP software together with employee self-service subscriptions proved to be the partner OBT, which was awarded the innovation prize for this. In addition, the number of Abacus employees increased by 37 to 439 last year. The entire group, including the subsidiaries in Biel, Thalwil and Germany, employed 556 people at the end of the year.

Source and further information: Abacus Research AG