Objective’s expansion into the UK public sector market has suffered under the austerity drive by the new coalition government, causing a 4% drop in revenue for the 2011 financial year. However the company has reported Asia Pacific revenue grew by 11% to $A31.7 million and there was a 37% growth in profit.

Tony Walls, CEO, Objective Corporation said: “We are pleased to report that our strategy of commitment to the public sector has led to an increase in revenue in the Asia Pacific region and that despite austerity programs across the United Kingdom public sector we continued to acquire new customers in the region.

“During the year we delivered our next generation enterprise content management platform Objective 8 ECM, a new version of our cloud based solution Objective Online 4 and launched Objective Enterprise Search all of which will deliver new revenue opportunities for the company”.

Major sales in the Asia Pacific included being awarded a strategic long-term contract with the NSW Roads and Traffic Authority to rollout an enterprise-wide solution for 6500 users. Objective also achieved success with the signing of Victorian State Trustees which was its first new Victorian State Government customer in some years.

Other new customers in the Asia Pacific region include: MidCoast Water, Growth Management Queensland, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, Department of Trade and Economic Development, South Australia, Department of Planning and Local Government, South Australia, Department of State Development, Western Australia and Logan City Council.

Objective’s penetration of the New Zealand Local Government sector continues to deepen, with further sales of its online and ECM offerings. New customers in this market included Christchurch City Council, Clutha District Council, Queenstown Lake District Council and Environment Southland.

“Our ongoing commitment to service excellence meant that we were able to deliver a high number of successful project outcomes for our customers,” said Walls.

“This was evidenced by the decision of the Australian Department of Defence, to extend their contract and implement a large scale upgrade of Objective ECM.”

“The prevailing weak economic conditions across the United Kingdom and the United States created a challenging environment in which to acquire new customers.

“However despite these circumstances, we were pleased to welcome Bedford Borough Council, University of Portsmouth in the UK and Allegheny County in the US to our customer community.”

“Market confidence in our innovation strategy was evidenced by one of Objective’s largest European customers, Welsh Government’s, early upgrade plan to Objective ECM 8.

“Objective has continued to make a significant investment in research and development. This year’s investment was $9.3 million, approximately 23 per cent of revenue (FY10: $9.4 million) and concentrated on strengthening our core technologies, developing new capabilities and creating a series of new web based applications that benefit the public sector.

“The release of Objective ECM 8 marks the next generation in Objective’s world class enterprise content, collaboration and process management solution.

“Objective entered into a strategic partnership with Exalead enabling the provision of superior Enterprise Search. This is a significant long-term investment for Objective and one that we expect will deliver benefits for our stakeholders into the future.

Mr Walls said, “The outlook for FY2012 is encouraging. Our business strategy of focusing on the needs of the public sector and our expertise in this target market well position us to deliver improved results in the coming financial year.”