Ian Oldrey, newly-appointed managing director of software provider Ten-25 Software, wants to take the company back to its roots.

That’s not to say he’s feeling nostalgic for main frame computers the size of a small bungalow; far from it. His aim is innovation.

Ten-25 was founded over 30 years ago by Norman Symcox and Ian’s father Baird Oldrey, whom he describes as a "real innovator".

"I’d like to get back to some core values that my father established when he set up the business.

"Today the ability to produce an invoice on a system is pretty straightforward but in the early 70s for a company to do that was almost magical. It was incredible innovation, particularly with products like timber where it was more than just a unit product.

"I’m really looking to take the business back to being an innovator, to being a frontrunner in terms of the capabilities of the system and making use of the best devices and the latest software platforms; delivering the best functionality to people."

Mr Oldrey joined Ten-25 in 1997 and in that time has seen the evolution of the company’s ERP software from UniStrip to Strip 5 to UniTrade 360 which was launched just over two years ago.

UniTrade was developed specifically for merchants and is designed to handle complex products, such as timber, which are sold in packs, batches or by volume.

"It was designed to be able to handle products and stock effectively as separate entities which means it’s easy to handle stock at different locations, whether it’s on the quay or at different branches, or splitting stock into lots and sub-lots," said Mr Oldrey.

"That advanced capability comes through in all the operations of the system, whereas a lot of systems will be designed to handle something straightforward like unit product, and the ability to handle more advanced products is tacked on afterwards."

There would be few companies now without some sort of software system but those that have just a financial system, such as Sage, lack the timber trading functionality to handle packs of timber and do a conversion of one product to another.

Under Mr Oldrey’s leadership Ten-25 will remain focused on trading systems for merchants but he also wants to look at new product development. It will continue to develop its core UniTrade product but also trading applications for tablets and smartphones.

"We’re initially looking at things like stocktaking and retail sales, but over time it will expand to cover the whole trading cycle," said Mr Oldrey.

Of course UniTrade offers stocktaking functionality now but Ten-25 is developing an application that will be available to the whole market, not just existing customers.

"You won’t have to be a user of our main trading system in order to use this application for stocktaking," said Mr Oldrey. "Of course it will be beneficial to our existing customers but it will also be open to anyone who wants to stocktake anything."

These new applications need to be intuitive for the user so Mr Oldrey has employed developers from the games industry.

"With our traditional systems people quite rightly invest in training to make sure they get the most out of the system. With the new ones people will be able to perform a simple function without any instruction; it should be obvious from just looking at the screen," said Mr Oldrey.

"People use email, do internet banking and book holidays without any training from the company that supplies them so we’re hoping that buying and selling and stock control will be able to go down that route as well."

Software continually changes to anticipate, or meet, customers’ expectations, and Ten-25 recently updated UniTrade’s analysis and reporting tools.

"One of the biggest benefits you can provide is analysis that helps managers make strategic decisions," said Mr Oldrey.

Using a simple drag and drop system, the new tools allow merchants to see all their data any way they want, from a top line overview of annual income to line-by-line detail for a range of filters such as customer, product or profit margin.

Instant graph tools create quick visual representations and comparisons in a range of graph and chart options and everything can be exported to another file type, such as Excel.

"It’s a very powerful tool and I’m very proud of it," said Mr Oldrey.

UniTrade also accommodates web sales, and can be linked to an existing web shop, meeting the demands of what Mr Oldrey identifies as a growing trend for merchants to sell online.

"A lot of the merchanting market has felt their customers weren’t ready for it but some companies have a good online presence.

There’s a lucrative market for people who do web sales alongside their traditional business of customers who want to place an order over the phone," he said.

And it’s not just software that is changing, but also the way companies manage their IT. "When I joined Ten-25 17 years ago most of our customers employed an IT manager to look after their systems in-house. Now only 3-4% employ someone specifically to handle IT," said Mr Oldrey.

"They’ll use a local IT company to provide networking and computers but they look to us as the supplier to effectively manage their system for them and take a of lot responsibility."

Ten-25 has always had a close partnership with its customers but now it tends to be the system users who contact the support desk and get help online rather than an IT manager.

Cloud computing has also brought changes.

Single-site companies tend to rely on an in-house server but those with a branch network are opting for the cloud.

"For a business with a number of branches it’s much more reliable for them to be served from a data centre rather than from a server at head office. It means more of the branches are able to trade more of the time and on a faster connection," said Mr Oldrey.

The cloud is also ideal for small operations as it doesn’t require a lot of infrastructure on site.

"You can literally have just a PC or laptop, log in to it on the cloud and away you go. There’s not a lot of set-up and management required."

There have also been changes in the speed with which software houses develop their products.

"When my father wrote the first generation of systems he wrote every single line of code. Now there are more tools available to allow us to adapt and mould a piece of existing software. It means you don’t write one system and make it last 10, 15 or 20 years like you used to."

So what’s the next step for UniTrade? Although Mr Oldrey won’t give too much away, the company is working on the next generation of software.

"We’re going back to the very heart of the order processing cycle and looking at how to make that, not just more flexible, but also faster. Trying to balance both of these requirements is quite a challenge but I’m very proud of some of the things we’ve designed so far."

Real-time appreciation
The success of any operation, says Dumfries Timber Co, is based solely on having real-time accurate information at your fingertips.

"Quick decisions need to be made regarding viability and profitability on customer margins and stock turn," it says.

The company, which uses UniTrade 360, says the software’s Trading Analysis enables "swift and necessary decisions" to be made.

"As a multi-location operation, when you’re dealing with over 250,000 lines of data at any time, a system such as UniTrade 360 and Trading Analysis is the best tool possible," a spokesperson said.