David van Driessche on the Gradual Software Acquisition by EskoArtwork

By: Cary Sherburne

May 9th, 2008 - EskoArtwork recently announced the acquisition of Gradual Software, a company formed by former Enfocus founders Peter Camps and David van Driessche after EskoArtwork acquired their company.  WhatTheyThink spoke with industry expert David Zwang, who has used Gradual products in some of his implementations, including the first truly global JDF deployment at the U.S. State Department, to see what he thought about the acquisition.  Here is what he said:

I think the acquisition of Gradual by EskoArtwork was a brilliant move for all involved as well as the industry as a whole.  The Gradual team, which is primarily the founders of Enfocus, has an excellent handle on the pulse of the industry and workflows. While I really love the work they have done at Gradual with the development of the amazing Switch product line, as well as the community they developed through the Crossroads initiative, they didn't seem to have the resources to get the word out to the global community.  The acquisition should give them the resources they need to not only get the word out, but to create a broad distribution channel and leverage the technology in the various Enfocus and Switch product lines to create even better solutions for the industry.

We also interviewed David van Driessche to get his perspective.

David van Driessche

WTT:  David, great to speak with you, and congratulations on the acquisition of Gradual Software by your former company, EskoArtwork.  Things do go in a circle sometimes, don’t they?

DVD:  The good thing about this acquisition is that EskoArtwork has taken the time to decide what to do with Enfocus, whether they wanted to keep it running, and the acquisition of Gradual is proof of that they believe those resources will invigorate that part of their portfolio.  They have decided this part of the market is important to them and are doing something about it!  It is a good place to come back to.  I wouldn’t have believed this would happen three years ago, but I am glad it has happened.

WTT:  Can you give us some of the inside story on how the acquisition came about?  I know that EskoArtwork, or its Enfocus division, had a somewhat competitive product, PitStop Automate, which it seemed had been deemphasized of late.

DVD:  We started talking about this acquisition quite some time ago, soon after it became clear that Esko was interested in acquiring Artwork Systems in August 2007, but really started talking in earnest early 2008.  Once EskoArtwork made the strategic decision that Enfocus was something they were interested in and decided to form it into a separate business unit, things went very fast.  It shows EskoArtwork has a commitment to that part of the business and can act very decisively.

PitStop Automate was discontinued a while before the acquisition of Gradual Software, and at the same time Enfocus started participating much more actively in the Crossroads community. EskoArtwork still has a number of other workflow solutions in its portfolio, by the way. They all add significant value and they are positioned towards different environments than Switch. From a product perspective, the acquisition is perfectly complementary.

WTT:  What will your role in the company be post-acquisition? What about Peter Camps?

DVD:  Peter Camps is going to lead the new Enfocus business unit within EskoArtwork as Senior Vice President for Enfocus with four people directly reporting to him: Filiep Maes, Director of Enfocus Software Development; Saskia Desmet, Director of Enfocus Sales; Elli Cloots, Director of Enfocus Services; and myself as Director of Enfocus Marketing.

WTT:  Can you share some of the ways customers have used LightSwitch, FullSwitch and PowerSwitch?

DVD:  It is surprising to look at the users that we have, ranging from small companies with five people, to companies that have 10 installations and use it as the backbone for the whole company— a whole range of sizes and complexities using the solution.  I have been involved in many of the professional services projects that we do for customers, doing some of the scripting and so on.  It is just amazing what it can be used for. 

To give just one example, one of our U.S. customers is the Miami-Dade government.  They use Switch with huge 16,000-page files.  Each page has a reference number, and they want to make individual page PDFs, saving each individual PDF page using the reference number as the file name.  They were able to automate that entire process. Not a typical application but an interesting one for sure.   Use cases range from this to automating workflows with Photoshop and just about anything else you can think of.  Every project I have seen so far is different and they represent much more creative solutions than I had expected.  In most cases, Switch is automating processes that consumed manual labor previously; it gives the people involved time to concentrate on the interesting parts of their jobs. And those interesting tasks usually deliver additional value to their companies - that is a true win-win situation. 

WTT:  What are the key benefits you expect to get out of the acquisition?  What are the benefits to your customers?

DVD:  Gradual goes from a very small company to a much bigger group with more resources available.  We are backed by the complete EskoArtwork organization, and that is good for us and for our customers. For Enfocus customers, it is now very clear that they continue to be important to EskoArtwork. There is a renewed commitment towards advancing product development and marketing at an accelerated pace. Lastly, if you look at the range of technologies available within EskoArtwork, synergies are already starting to emerge on both sides of the fence, and there will definitely be technology cooperation on that level. 

When I talk about cooperation, some people assume we will be fully integrated into EskoArtwork.  That is not the case.  The dedicated Enfocus business unit is in control of its own strategy and product direction; the company clearly intends to keep the Enfocus (and ex-Gradual) products separate from the rest of EskoArtwork. Enfocus will be offering different products serving different markets, with their own future and development cycle, and we can keep our efforts focused on our market.  That is a very important message to the existing customer base.

WTT:  How many employees total are or will be in the Enfocus business unit?

DVD:  The Enfocus business unit comprises over 40 people today, including the ex-Gradual staff members in Ghent, but not counting the outsourced development for Switch. We rely on EskoArtwork staff outside the business unit for services including human resources, finance and IT.

WTT:  Can we expect to see the Switch family of products now become more visible in North America?  I know it has been difficult to build a robust channel here.

DVD:  Definitely.  Enfocus products are already well established in the usual catalogs and on-line sales channels.  In addition we plan to build a robust value-added channel that focuses on enabling automation with products such as Switch and PitStop Server, within the context of the Crossroads initiative.  It’s true that this is a substantial effort; again, the new setup will provide us with the resources to accomplish this task more effectively.

WTT:  I am assuming we will see you at drupa.  Anything new planned for the show?

DVD:  It is too early to talk about what we are going to announce.  We just went through the acquisition and we are figuring out how everything is going to work together in the bigger context.  Clearly, Switch will remain a cornerstone of our product line, and we will continue our focus on the PitStop products. Yes, we’ll have exciting news at drupa, but you’ll have to ask me again as the big event comes closer...

WTT:  Can you tell us a little about the Crossroads initiative?  Do you plan to continue that work?

DVD:  Crossroads has helped us become aware of other partners out there that might be good distributors or resellers for both Switch and Enfocus.  It is a community centered around automation for publishing.  What that means is a platform for vendors to talk among themselves.  Crossroads is centered on Switch and about automation with Switch as the backbone.  Around that, we looked at which vendors we have Switch configurators for, like Callas, Adobe, Enfocus, Quark—all of the tools and applications we can automate.  Crossroads brings all those vendors together so that we can go to the end user as a group to talk to them about automation and offer them a number of products that already work together, saving them the trouble of having to go out and find them all on their own.  We can drive the whole process, and it makes it easier for the end user.  The Crossroads site has a number of things that have already been tested and work. 

In Europe, we organized a series of seminars where we invited end users and partners, with a keynote on automation from a theoretical perspective explaining why it is important and what kind of money they can save. After that, we offer practical information, a demo of Switch, and each of the other vendors has a chance to show their product in combination with Switch. It fills a complete day.  We have done five or six in the last two months, with on average about 60 end users at each.  The feedback has been terrific, and they would recommend in a heartbeat that others attend and benefit from this practical information.  This seems to be a concept that works, and we would like to take it to the U.S. as soon as possible.

WTT:  Anything else you would like to add before we close?

DVD:  One concern that is bound to come up at some point is that by having Switch as an Enfocus product, will the open nature of the application remain the same and will we still work with and promote competitive technologies. We have had that question a number of times now, and the answer is yes.  We believe that open automation is exactly what Switch stands for and there is no way we are going to change that policy.  If a user wants to use a Callas preflight tool instead of an Enfocus preflight tool, fine. Of course we will compete with other preflight vendors, but then I firmly believe that companies should compete by making their products better, not by closing their systems. We will be actively looking for technologies to automate and continue to support the open approach of Switch.  And that commitment is not just coming out of Enfocus; it is fully backed by the EskoArtwork management as well.

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