Axcelasia primed for growth, driven by governance and risk management

• Hopes to more than double its client base over next 2yrs
• To expand to Laos and Vietnam in second half of this year 

 
KUALA Lumpur-based Axcelasia Inc hopes to grow its Enterprise Management System (EMS) business significantly over the next three years, saying that more organisations are starting to see the benefits of having good governance and risk management.
 
“The motivation has changed,” executive director Ranjit Singh (pic above) told Digital News Asia (DNA) in Kuala Lumpur recently.
 
“In the past, companies did governance, risk and compliance (GRC) because the authorities asked them to do so.
 
“Today, they are doing it because they want to improve their organisation, efficiency and operations,” he added.
 
Axcelasia, which listed on the Singapore Exchange’s Catalist board last November, claims its homegrown EMS software, now in its fourth version, is currently being used by some 100 companies in Malaysia. Most of them are public-listed companies, including government-linked companies.
 
Unlike previous versions, the new EMS solution is cloud-enabled.
 
“With this new Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) business model, we hope that we can reach out to more companies in the country and in the region,” said Ranjit.
 
He believes that the cloud-enablement would allow the company to grow its client base to some 250 companies over the next two years.
 
“Organisations can subscribe to the solutions based on their needs. For example, if they only want the incident management and insurance modules, they can just subscribe to those,” he added.
 
Growing the EMS business
 
Axcelasia has four business segments: Tax Advisory, Business Consultancy, EMS, and Business Support.
 
As at Dec 31, 2015, its EMS segment contributed RM1.4 million in revenue. In contrast, its tax advisory and business consultancy segments contributed RM10.4 million and RM11.5 million, respectively. Its business support segment contributed RM2 million during the year. [RM1 = US$0.24]
 
Its EMS solution comprises modules such as enterprise resource management, compliance monitoring, internal audit, incident management, and insurance management.
 
“This software helps our customers assure their shareholders and board of directors that they are managing the organisation at a level that is acceptable by industry practice, and that there’s no hanky-panky going on in the organisation,” declared Ranjit.
 
The software also helps customers improve their operation efficiency and reduce incidents over time, he claimed.
 
For example, using the incident and insurance management module, employees can enter details of workplace health and safety incidents. The software then keeps a database of details such as the cause, location and time of the incident, and the impact of the incident on the organisation.
 
Upon being notified of an incident, the module leader can then validate the incident immediately and submit the details to the insurance agent through the software for processing of insurance claims.
 
“Over time, this can help companies reduce incident cases,” claimed Ranjit.
 
Overseas expansion
 
By the second half of this year, Axcelasia will be looking to expand to two new markets: Laos and Vietnam.
 
“We will then expand into the other South-East Asian markets like Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines over the next two years,” said Ranjit (pic).
 
When asked why Laos and Vietnam were chosen as the company’s first two overseas destinations instead of the highly populated Indonesia, Ranjit said the decision was driven by two factors.
 
“We see these markets are hungry for GRC solutions. Also, there are not many players there, and many organisations there need help,” he said.
 
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