The interconnected subject areas of NTR GmbH.
H & E: Dr. Rubbe, after the sale of your company shares in DPS-Software, you have formed a group of companies with your Beteiligungs-GmbH, which includes no less than 11 companies. What motivated you to do this?
Dr. Rubbe: I always intended to be self-employed in the last phase of my professional life. I really enjoy my work, I can implement projects directly, realize concepts, and that’s why I want to continue as long as my health cooperates and I can still contribute something to success.
Now you have a holding company with 11 companies. Is there a red line there or do you each follow your own goals?
There are two focal points: One is the CAD/CAM business and the other is ERP and CRM. We have focused these areas somewhat differently than we did before with the DPS Software Group. There we were very CAD/CAM-heavy, now the focus has developed more in the direction of ERP. We offer our ERP solutions in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, as well as in Poland. In the future – we will also market enterprise software for SMEs in the Czech Republic.
In our strategy, we promote ‘best practices’ and ensure that they are shared within the group. If we have good experience with a product in one country, it means that we will then use it in the other countries as well. We continue to operate in five countries, D-A-CH, Poland, Czech Republic.
We want to develop the aforementioned focal points evenly. At the moment, it looks like around 240 of our 440 employees work in the ERP area and 200 in the CAD/CAM environment.
With 24 subsidiaries, NTR is represented in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Poland and the Czech Republic.
But the CAD/CAM topic only relates to the two eastern countries?
At the moment, yes. We have reached an agreement with Bechtle that we will not sell any SolidWorks or SolidCAM products in the D-A-CH market for the next two years.
But that’s not that long?
That’s the way it is, and I could well imagine becoming active again in the CAM area after that, if there is an entry opportunity. In the CAD environment this is not planned, because this market segment is already strongly occupied.
Would that be Solidcam again?
It doesn’t necessarily have to be Solidcam. We also have other CAM products on offer in Poland and the Czech Republic that come into question. In addition, we have also started additive manufacturing in both countries, using technology from Marktforged. In the Czech Republic, we already had a 3D scanner business with equipment from Creaform, one of the world’s leading suppliers. We will extend this to Poland and start here in reverse engineering.
Were the 11 companies all already existing or did you also found some new ones?
They all already existed and were added to DPS Software over time. We joined DPS in 2008 and then, starting around 2011, we developed a strategy on how to build a second foothold and also how to operate more internationally. We then systematically implemented that and were quite successful in doing so. By the end, we had grown by a factor of 5 in the last 10 years.
In the DPS Group, we then divided the work in such a way that Manfred Gravius was responsible for the operative business and I was responsible for the further development of the company group. In the course of this, I acquired all the new companies and also looked after them in the last few years. Therefore, I know the companies very well and we decided in NTR to continue them in the core elements in the same way.
Have you chosen medium-sized companies as your target group?
It’s quite clear that we work for small and medium-sized businesses. Our goal is to help SMEs digitize their business processes and make them successful along the way.
And by medium-sized businesses do you mean 5-500 employees?
We define the term “midmarket” broadly, and yes, it plays out between 10 and 500 employees. Beyond that, there is a certain subsection of our portfolio with which we can also address larger companies.
Dr. Thomas Rubbe, Managing Partner of the NTR Group.
Let’s talk about your two areas of focus again: You need separate specialists for CAD/CAM & Co. and ERP, don’t you?
Yes, you can’t mix the two. But what we do is work on the interfaces to integrate CAD and ERP systems. Today, we already have a number of interfaces to bring together a large number of ERP systems with a large number of CAD systems.
We also have our own software in each of the areas, and we also have our own modules that we offer to complement that. That’s one thing we want to do differently than we used to do at DPS. We already do about 10-12% of our business today with our own software. We want to expand that a lot in the future so that we get to at least 20%. We are currently working on this. We have 25 developers in Germany alone, and we also have employees working in this area in Poland. The development teams will, of course, cooperate across countries so that, for example, nothing is developed twice.
Shortly before the end of DPS, there was talk of using the ERP software to set up a new tool management system. Did that still happen and is this software with you now?
In DPS there was another ERP system from a Spanish manufacturer. This was to be done with the system, which was very production-oriented. But this team has become independent and is no longer part of the NTR group.
So what are you going to do in terms of the 3D Experience platform?
We are offering it, but all beginnings are hard. There are also some sales, but in still small numbers. The problem is also with the established Solidworks software as we have known it. This is a quite excellent CAD system, with which customers are highly satisfied. And now it takes a lot of convincing to get them to move away from it and to the cloud-based system. It will probably be easier with new customers, who can then be put on the 3D Experience track straight away.
But there are now also other collaboration platforms. It remains to be seen who will be successful there with which platform in the CAD/CAM area.
What do you think about the automation of design with the help of configurators?
A lot will happen in the near future. But we also have to wait and see what the manufacturers have to offer.
Well, the engineering systems on offer, such as Tactonworks or Custom X or Intent, which can be used to set up configurators, do exist and we believe they are mature!
So as a reseller you have to wait until you get the right products. For example, we have been looking for Swood, a CAD/CAM system for the wood sector, which works with rules, for a long time!
The company in Germany now consists…
…consists of three individual companies, Datatronic AG, DPS Business Solution and Sellmore.
As a digitalization partner for SMEs, Datatronic offers commercial software and IT solutions from a single source. The portfolio includes ERP, DMS as well as IT infrastructure and hosting. DPS BS is the largest Sage partner in Germany. In addition to the classic ERP business, the company specializes in the implementation of Sage’s HR suite solutions. It also offers comprehensive IT services (hosting, business process outsourcing, etc.). At DPS BS, proprietary software solutions are created for the NTR Group.
Sellmore is the expert on CRM and customer management. Sellmore has a wide CRM portfolio for different customer needs and helps customers to choose the right system. Project planning, implementation, training and support are offered on CRM solutions from Sage, CAS, SAP, Salesforce and Zoho. Since Sellmore knows these five packages very well, they can naturally advise customers on system selection better than a consultant who knows little about implementation.
Dr. Rubbe, thank you very much for the interview.
www.ntr.de