Fruitbowl - Fresh Ideas from Hawke's Bay

More than 20,000 businesses are set to save time and money as two New Zealand IT leaders join forces.

IMS Payroll and accountancy software provider Xero announced the commercial partnership today with both large and small businesses expected to benefit from the new synergy.

IMS Payroll is one of New Zealand’s largest suppliers of payroll software systems and currently has more than 10,000 customers both in New Zealand and off shore.

IMS General Manager Patrick Hegarty said the integration with Xero had been driven by IMS users.

“Xero has had a huge impact on the NZ accounting software market with significant numbers of IMS users moving to Xero.”

“It is natural for us to develop integration with financial solutions which have the market share,” Mr Hegarty said.

“Xero and IMS Payroll are consistently used and recommended together by chartered accountants and this popularity with financial professionals highlights the value and reliability of these products.”

New Zealand High Tech Entreprenueur of the Year 2006/2007 and Xero chief executive Rod Drury said the partnership also created significant excitement from technology’s point of view.

“Its exciting to see cloud based technology communicating with on premise software and as a result, offering increased flexibility for our customers.”

Mr Drury added that the partnership between IMS Payroll and Xero was a powerful one with the combined customer base topping 20,000.

“For XERO it’s great to be working with such a respected industry leader,” Mr Drury said.

Mr Drury said that New Zealand customers benefited from strong commercial partnerships.

“The close knit nature of New Zealand business means we have a very good relationship with IMS PAYROLL – we know the people behind the business.”