London, September 9, 2020
Witherbys, a privately-owned publishing company based in Edinburgh, Scotland, has invested over £500,000 in updating its IT infrastructure including the implementation of a new publishing and ERP software solution, knkPublishing.
The software will be used in the areas of Sales Order Processing, Subscriptions, Warehouse Management, Royalties, Customer Relationship Management, Financial Accounting, as well as for Marketing and to provide a feed to their online stores.
Commercial Director, Kat Heathcote says: ‘Our aim was to implement a software service that enabled us to streamline and enhance the processes in place with our authors, partners, customers and suppliers. Our business has grown significantly over the last few years, and we understood that in order to continue with our growth plans, we needed a solution that allowed us to move away from an in-house legacy system to a single application that would provide us with a company-wide solution.’
Continuity of business practices throughout the project was key for Witherbys. CEO Iain Macneil commented: ‘We set out to implement a system to enable us to future-proof our business, allowing us to concentrate on our core business of providing innovative, up-to date and reliable content for the marine industry. We successfully implemented the software during the COVID-19 pandemic, which brought several restrictions, including the removal of personal meetings and interaction. However, we were able to continue to work to full capacity throughout the delivery of the project.’
knkPublishing is the only Microsoft certified publishing software in the world. Powered by Microsoft Dynamics with publishing-specific functionality. knkPublishing is used by publishing and media companies worldwide, however, this collaboration with Witherbys marks knk’s first project led by its UK team.
John Lawson, knk UK MD, says: ‘The key to the success of this project was the close collaboration between the Witherby project team and knk teams both in the UK and regional offices. The fact that knk staff are specialists in technology and are completely dedicated to the publishing industry means that we truly understand the challenges facing our clients, which then helps us to build long-term relationships with them. We look forward to supporting and working with Witherbys in the years to come.’
About Witherbys
Witherbys is one of Scotland’s largest and most successful publishing companies, with a portfolio of over 400 specialist titles that are exported to over 110 countries.
Established in 1740, Witherbys has long been involved in the maritime industry. In 2008, when the company was bought by Seamanship International from the Witherby family, the name was changed to Witherby Publishing Group and the company was brought, in its entirety, to Scotland. Twelve years later, having grown the company tenfold, Witherbys is now one of the largest providers of regulatory and guidance materials to the marine industry.
About the knk Group
The knk Group has about 450 customers in the publishing and media industry across North America, Europe and Asia and has offices in the US, UK, France and Germany.
knk develops and distributes knkPublishing – the only Microsoft certified publishing software in the world. It complements the range of services provided by Microsoft Dynamics 365 with publishing-specific functionality for book, magazine, and specialist publishers and is based on the latest Microsoft technology. The software can be used in the cloud as well as on-premise and can be either perpetually licensed or rented via subscription. In addition, the knk Group offers BI, CRM (knk365 for Media Sales), Customer Engagement (knk365 Market Insights) and Marketing Automation (knk365 Marketing Automation) solutions dedicated to meet the publishing and media industry’s needs.
In addition to knkPublishing and the knk365 solutions, the knk Group also offers the brands of Bradbury Phillips International Ltd, the most established provider of Rights and Royalty software for Publishers and Literary Agents, and “VM Media Manager”- the market leading advertising, subscription and circulation management software in Germany.
Contact knk Group
knk Group
Julia Redner
Phone +49 (0)431 579 72-784
E-Mail: JRedner@knk.com
Website: knk.com