Henley Business Software based in Henley-on-Thames apparently fell victim to financial woes shortly after acquiring Planet Software Ltd in May (CI No 1,671). After failing to comply with a voluntary creditors arrangement, the company ended up in receivership with Ernst & Young acting as Administrators. At this point the picture gets a little hazy. Some sources claim that Henley’s managing director Nigel Geary sold the company to Aston, Birmingham-based Fame Computers Ltd, while Ernst & Young was clinching a deal with the Australian software firm SQLSoft Pty Ltd, Sydney. A spokesman at Ernst & Young denied this but declined to comment on what Fame has actually bought. SQLSoft has bought the worldwide intellectual rights to the SQLVision range of database communications products. Some people reckon this means that Fame has bought a year’s lease on the Henley building, some company cars and a technical director. However, Geary denies this and claims that Fame has acquired the systems integration division of Henley Business Software, which will henceforth trade as Henley Business Systems under his supervision. He argues that SQLSoft has acquired activities which were unprofitable or non-strategic. Furthermore, he says that Fame has also acquired a graphics application development division that will be part of Henley Business Systems and that is designing a follow-on product to SQLVision using Oracle which will take the product into the open systems market. SQLSoft, meanwhile, is completing the development work that was begun on a Windows 3.0 version of SQLVision and will bring this to market soon.
