PHC moves forward with management solution for micro-companies without initial investment

PHC is starting today with a new ERP application for micro-companies, with a new licensing system that eliminates the initial investment in software and servers, making it easier to join. The monthly cost starts from 49 euros, for two users, and already includes the DataCenter service.

The project had been in preparation for two and a half years and underwent several testing phases before seeing the light of day, including a pilot phase with two dozen companies since January.

Ricardo Parreira, general manager of PHC, explains to TeK that PHC FX will cover a segment of companies that were not covered by software-house management solutions. “We feel that micro-companies have just as valid needs for reliable and easy-to-use tools as larger companies. Or even more because they have less resources to dedicate to this area ”, he justifies.

PHC FX

The initial investment for the adoption of management software, with some adaptation to their processes, purchase of servers and training, was an obstacle that caused many companies to end up using mere invoicing programs, basing the analysis and registration on applications like Excel.

With PHC FX the objective is to give these companies a reliable, secure and accessible solution anywhere and on any operating system through the browser. The data is stored on an Interhost Datacenter server, with all the guarantees of confidentiality and security that a professional hosting system can guarantee, with daily backups and geographical redundancy.

There is no initial investment to be made and companies only have to pay 39 euros per month for two licenses and another 10 euros per month for hosting the data.

“Part of this technology, especially the analyzes, was only available to large companies” recalls Ricardo Parreira, who believes that PHC FX will bring greater flexibility to micro-companies to manage their management information, which will guarantee greater competitiveness.

The potential for using the application is enormous. PHC estimates that there are 150 thousand micro companies in Portugal and 1.9 million in Spain, a market that it also wants to conquer. Even so, Ricardo Parreira is very conservative in his adhesion projections, pointing to a total of 200 clients by the end of the year and 5,000 to 5 years.

The internationalization of the application is one of the objectives defined by PHC, which already has interfaces prepared in Spanish and English. As in Portugal, where the solution will be marketed through partners, PHC is looking for the right allies across borders to take PHC FX to other destinations, for the time being in Europe, since the software does not yet support multi-currency.

In Portugal, other developments for the SaaS model (Software as a Service) are also planned. Without cannibalizing the other applications it sells, PHC wants to extend PHC FX to larger companies and the launch of the Advanced solution, aimed at SMEs, is expected within a year.