Squiz

This article is about the software services company. For the baseball player, see Squiz Pillion.
Squiz Pty Ltd
Private
Industry Software
Founded 1998
Headquarters Sydney, Australia
Number of locations
 Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Hobart, Perth, Brisbane, Adelaide, Edinburgh, Auckland Wellington, London, New York and Szczecin
Products Online publishing, web content management, customer experience & enterprise search, business transformation and digital transformation
Subsidiaries Funnelback
Website www.squiz.net

Squiz is a multinational company that first launched in Australia offering digital engagement software in 1998. It specialises in enterprise content management systems (CMS), customer experience software (CRM, Analytics) and consulting services. The company headquarters are located in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, with the majority of its operations now in the United Kingdom and United States.[1] The company also has six additional Australian offices in Canberra, Melbourne, Hobart, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, with six other locations abroad. Squiz currently has 450 staff globally.

Squiz has recently focused on developing its Business Transformation consulting practice through providing digital strategy, vision and execution planning and coaching.

The Squiz Suite is regarded as the company's main digital experience platform, which incorporates a content management system (CMS) with search and web analytics, along with integration tools for Customer Relationship Management and Marketing Automation.

History

The company was founded in 1998, in Sydney, Australia. Over the first few years of the company's existence, they launched and developed MySource Classic. This operated under a general open source license. It was a page-based tool for building and managing online projects including websites and intranets.[2]

In 2005, Squiz's MySource Matrix was demonstrated by the Government of Australia to show the viability of open source software, when compared to closed commercial alternatives.[3]

In 2007, the company announced that it would be re-licensing its MySource Matrix Tool under the GNU General Public License. The software was originally classed as open source, but many felt the move to the new license would make the product more open.[3]

At the end of the financial year in 2008, Squiz announced global revenues of $15m. This at the time was an annual growth rate of 150%.[4] In July 2009, Squiz acquired the search company Funnelback. The Australian-based search firm was originally a spin-off from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in 2006. As part of the deal, it was stated Funnelback would continue to trade as a separate company and as its own brand.[5]

Following the successful launch of a number of cloud-based products, the company launched Squiz Suite, which comprised Squiz Matrix, Squiz CMS, Squiz Analytics and Squiz Search. This was seen as the company's first major move into the web engagement management market. During the same announcement, the company also stated that MySource Matrix would be retired as a brand, and rebranded as Squiz Matrix.[6] In 2012, Ovum announced that they had named Squiz as a market leader for web content management. The report stated, "Squiz’s position as a market leader proves that an open source solution can be as functionally rich as a product from a large vendor."[7]

Squiz announced in September 2013, that they would be expanding their operations into North America. Their first office on the continent would be located on Madison Avenue, New York City. The move came after Squiz experienced double-digit growth across both Asia Pacific and Europe markets since its inception in 1998.[8]

They were recognised in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Web Content Management since October 2014. Squiz are listed as a vendor alongside Adobe, IBM and Microsoft.[9] The Squiz Suite was placed in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Horizontal Portals in 2014 and 2015. In 2015, Squiz’s search product of wholly owned subsidiary Funnelback, debuted in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Search in September 2015. In late 2014, it was announced that Squiz had acquired InsightfulCRM.[10]

In 2015, SugarCRM honored Squiz as one of their Partners of the Year and also the best Value Added Reseller.[11] During the same year it was also announced that Squiz had played a major part in reworking the online websites for a number of institutions including the New South Wales Department of Industry[12] and The Women's Institute.[13]

In late 2015, Squiz assisted the University of Salford with a Tinder-style app. The app helped students quickly decide which course would be best suited for them.[14] The app was implemented to fill courses for clearing at the University, which allowed potential students to wipe "yes" or "no" to courses they would enjoy. The app was released as Match Made in Salford and would match users if they said yes to a course and also had the entry grades to apply. After "swiping", the potential student would be left with a list of potential courses they could then apply for.[15]

Products

The main product offered by Squiz is the Squiz Matrix. It is recognised by industry analysts and used by a number of institutions to manage their website portfolios, including the University of Salford.[16]

Squiz also has a analytics program called Squiz analytics. It was launched at the same time as the Squiz Suite and was also part of the package. It enables users to test their sites while supporting multivariate testing on a website. This means it manages visitors to receive different viewing experiences of a website, and then measure their engagement, relative to which design they have viewed. The tool also measures return on investment and supports other forms of testing, such as A/B testing. Much of the data is taken from multiple Google analytics accounts.[6]

Squiz Search was developed after the company acquired Funnelback. It uses the Funnelback search engine, which produces conventional search engine results, along with contextual navigation. The development of Squiz Search came after the Funnelback technology was integrated into the MySource Matrix.[6]

References

  1. ↑ Jenkins, Chris (28 August 2007). "Squiz win opens door for more". The Australian. Retrieved 15 February 2010.
  2. ↑ Natividad, Angela (28 November 2006). "Squiz Joins Others In Olympia, Adds 2 Cents to Web 2.0 Discourse". CMSWire.
  3. 1 2 LeMay, Renai (16 January 2007). "Squiz bows to GPL pressure". ZDNet. Retrieved 28 July 2010.
  4. ↑ "Squiz announces global revenues of $15m, stakes claim for new, high-growth 'Supported Open Source' CMS Arena". Econsultancy. 28 July 2008.
  5. ↑ LeMay, Renai (3 July 2009). "Squiz buys Funnelback". ZDNet.
  6. 1 2 3 Roe, David (19 August 2010). "Open Source Web CMS Maker Squiz Makes a Move to Web Engagement". CMSWire.
  7. ↑ "Squiz Named a Market Leader in Ovum Decision Matrix for Web Content Management". eConsultancy. 4 December 2012.
  8. ↑ "Squiz Launches North American Office". CIO magazine. 30 September 2013.
  9. ↑ MacComascaigh, Mick; Murphy, Jim; Tay, Gavin; Gilbert, Mark R. (9 October 2014). "Magic Quadrant for Web Content Management". Gartner.
  10. ↑ "Squiz acquires InsightfulCRM". Squiz. 4 August 2014.
  11. ↑ "18 Partners Honored for Business Performance and Innovation; 8 Partners Recognized For 10-Year Relationship With SugarCRM". SugarCRM. 22 April 2015.
  12. ↑ Gardiner, Bonnie (15 September 2015). "NSW Department of Industry undergoes digital transformation". CIO magazine.
  13. ↑ Roderick, Leonie (27 August 2015). "Women's Institute relaunches its digital offering in a bid to attract younger audiences". Marketing Week.
  14. ↑ Rossi, Ben (9 September 2015). "University of Salford matches students with courses using Tinder-style app". Information Age.
  15. ↑ Ali, Aftab (9 September 2015). "University of Salford launches Tinder-style Clearing app to 'match' students with their ideal course". The Independent.
  16. ↑ "Squiz-Matrix Web Content Management System". University of Salford.
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