Business Micros is set for another hugely successful year. Sales are up across the board as fabricators increasingly turn to software as a way of addressing the industry’s ongoing skills shortage.

Sales Team member Nick Bailey explained: “While there are obviously some really encouraging initiatives taking place on the skills training front at the moment, fabricators still tell us that they are finding it difficult to recruit experienced staff, and our software solutions are undoubtedly being used to help them plug those gaps.”

Business Micros programmes like Evolution and EvoNET have always been about optimising efficiency and, because they eliminate lots of manual tasks, they make it fairly easy for customers to evaluate payback. Using EvoNET to manage orders, plan production, schedule deliveries and take care of after-sales communication enables customers to make real savings on manpower. While it continues to be so difficult to recruit both production and office-based staff, that payback equation has become even more logical and compelling.

Nick Bailey added: “We’re increasingly being called in by customers who are worried not just about the shortage of labour but about the rising costs as well and who want to make sure that they are deploying our software as effectively as possible to try and futureproof their businesses as much as they can.

“Our response is to address those areas where the biggest savings can be made on man power and where their customers in turn will feel the biggest benefit. We’re also of course developing a whole new suite of Infinity products including Capture, Showroom and Register where the emphasis is on using software to generate leads, simplify marketing and even register products with only minimal manual input required.”

Arguably, it is the skills shortage which is also driving a good deal of the investment taking place in machinery at the moment and which is also leading to an upsurge in demand for Business Micros’ software machine links. Certainly, the team is busier than ever in this area and Business Micros itself is looking to recruit additional installation engineers to make sure it can keep up.

Nick Bailey said: “We’ve always had a policy training our own staff both in programming and installation and while the skills shortage clearly extends to our own sector as well, that’s definitely proving to be the right approach.”