Pitney Bowes CEO Michael Critelli said software is an increasingly important part of its value proposition for mailers. He said Group 1 had a broad range of products covering address management, data quality, document generation and delivery and marketing campaign management software that complemented its own mailing software line-up.
Stamford, Connecticut-based Pitney Bowes aims to integrate the mail and document-handling process across the enterprise into a market that it calls customer communications management, which it estimates is worth approximately $4bn and growing. A further attraction of Lanham, Maryland-based Group 1 is its customer base outside the US which will help Pitney Bowes grow its international footprint.
Group 1 will continue to operate under its current management and will operate under Pitney Bowes Global Enterprise Solution division, which in 2003 was responsible for $1.27bn of the company’s total revenue of $4.57bn.
The division currently embraces Pitney Bowes Management Services, which offers a range of services to manage the creation, processing, storage, retrieval, distribution and tracking of documents and messages in paper and digital form.
The division also offers software-enabled production mail systems, sorting equipment, incoming mail systems and electronic statement, billing and payment solutions.
Group 1 directors will probably be glad to say goodbye to the company’s stockholders. The company agreed to pay $17m for Sagent Technology Inc in April 2003 but the deal was delayed because it had to hold three stockholders’ meetings before sufficient numbers turned up to constitute a quorum and vote through the deal. As a result, it was forced to issue a profit warning after a three-month delay in closing the transaction.
This article is based on material originally published by ComputerWire
