Zig, market leader for software solutions for housing associates and commercial real estate, has acquired Skarp. Through this strategic combination, Zig strengthens its position in the market and adds unique knowledge and an innovative Business Intelligence platform for real estate organizations to its product portfolio. Skarp is Zig’s first strategic add-on since Main Capital Partners’ investment in November 2021.
Skarp helps to continuously improve the information provision in organizations and provides products and services based on sector-specific information standards. Over the past 7 years, the company has successfully developed a unique Business Intelligence platform primarily for the housing associations sector and, in addition to management information, also focuses on accountability information and improving data quality. The combination Skarp-Zig is a powerful combination. Skarp offers a VERA standardized information platform that sources its data from OpenData, ERP and expert systems. Combined with the data from Zig’s platforms, many new possibilities and insights arise, for example in the field of process optimization.
Zig and Skarp have the objective to form a single information platform for the entire real estate sector. This platform will be the place where housing associations and other real estate organizations can gain insights into their data.
Gerbert Kooij, director of Zig: “We see this collaboration as a unique opportunity to serve our customers even better. We get an enormous additional amount of data, based on the VERA standard. We make this information accessible to all real estate organizations, regardless of the source system with which they work and, in addition to process and management information, it provides an even greater advantage for tenants. They will soon receive even more personal and relevant information based on data. Think, for example, of insight into energy costs or water consumption and predicting maintenance (predictive data). How nice is it if you can take immediate action with the help of your housing association to jointly optimize the costs, reduce your costs and increase the joy of living?”
Skarp and Zig both believe in the use of data standards and have been making an active contribution to the continued development of data standards for years. Kobbe van Daatselaar, CTO at Zig, explains. “Data quality is crucial for working data-driven. The use of sector standards in Skarp’s information platform creates a generic data warehouse that is independent of data sources. This makes it possible to use all this data for standardized reporting, data exchange and sector-wide analyses. For example, real estate organizations will soon be able to predict when elevator maintenance is required on the basis of artificial intelligence with predictive data. In the future, they can take less chances.”
Richard van der Zee, CEO of Skarp, also sees the collaboration as a step forward. “Skarp has the ambition to serve the entire real estate sector on the basis of open standards. We dream of an information ecosystem that covers the entire sector. Many housing associations invest too much money in sub-optimal applications and shouldn’t need to reinvent the wheel over and over again. The sector can and must do better. Together with Zig, we can continue to grow rapidly and offer an information platform with which we together with other service providers can help customers to continuously improve their organization and services.”
The entire Skarp team is integrated into Zig’s organization. By doing this, Zig not only enriches its current portfolio with an innovative Business Intelligence platform, but also brings in a highly experienced team of data specialists with a great deal of sector knowledge. With the addition of Skarp, Zig now has approximately 120 employees.
About Zig Websoftware
Zig was founded in 2001 and has established a leading position in the housing and commercial real estate market. Zig delivers its software to a broad customer base of over 160 organizations. Examples of customers include De Alliantie, Rochdale, Sociale Verhuurders Haaglanden, DUWO, Mooiland, Klik voor Wonen, Thuis in Limburg, Elkien, Bouwinvest and a.s.r.. The company has approximately 100 employees.
About Skarp
Skarp actively helps to continuously improve the information supply within the housing corporation sector. Skarp has developed innovative information products and services based on (open) sector standards together with its customers for the last 7 years. Skarp delivers management information from the cloud, accountability information (Skarp is whitelisted for system-to-sytem delivery of the dVi to the regulator) and fully integrated data quality monitoring. With 40 corporations as customers, Skarp is the fastest growing BI provider in the sector and now also active in other sectors with its innovative platform. The Skarp team consists of 16 enthusiastic and knowledgeable specialists.
Main Capital Partners
Main Capital Partners is a leading software investor in the Benelux, DACH and the Nordics. Main has almost 20 years of experience in strengthening software companies and works closely together with management teams of its portfolio companies as a strategic partner, in order to realise sustainable growth and build excellent software groups. Main counts over 50 employees and has offices in The Hague, Stockholm and Düsseldorf. As of October 2021, Main has over EUR 2.2 billion of assets under management. Main has invested in more than 130 software companies to date. These companies have approximately 5,000 employees. The current active portfolio consists of 35 software groups with over EUR 600 million in combined revenues.
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