Azotel, John O Hare, CEO
An international software company focused in Europe, Africa, Canada and the U.S, Azotel provides an integrated operating system platform to broadband operators for end-to–end automated business processes. Azotel began doing business in Canada in 2008 and operates in North America primarily through a distributor network.
“My background is in Engineering focused on the Telecom sector and my introduction to North America was through Motorola where I worked in their Chicago & Cork offices until 2002. The Azotel story starts in 2002 when we started providing Wireless broadband services in Cork. Three years later we started building a software platform to enable automation of back-office transactions and by 2007, we had sold our wireless business, were concentrating on software productization and launched franchises across Ireland.
All through this period, I had maintained a good relationship with Motorola and in 2008 they introduced us to a cable company in Nova Scotia to bring broadband to the rural regions in the province. Nova Scotia proved to be a great reference site; they in fact invested in Azotel along with Enterprise Ireland. While in Nova Scotia, we were contacted by an Indianapolis company [www.solutions4ebiz.com] that found us on the web. This company was not only the beginning of our U.S. business but also became and continues to be our major distributor driving significant business development in the U.S. In fact, we have turned the distributor model on its head whereby this “small” company is now the “go to” contact for the other US distributors. They have taken the time to really understand the details of our solution and now incentivize other much larger distributors to sell the Azotel solution. Our use of a distributor model for route to market has also meant that we have not had to look into any company set-up or any other legal requirements.
The association with Motorola gave us good credibility – customers saw that they could obtain our services through Motorola or come to us directly and this has served as a key success factor. While you do have to prove yourself on the home turf before you expand abroad, the first question that comes up is where else in North America do we operate. The issue, at that time was that companies saw we were a small organization and worried that we might have folded – the link with Motorola and Enterprise Ireland went a long way in alleviating this concern in the early days.
Another key factor for success is to demonstrate that distance is of no object – make the effort to be physically present at critical meetings and respond to queries quickly – act as if you are a local company! We were able to hire a representative in North America to further develop channels through Enterprise Ireland’s Business Accelerator program. This gave us local presence and provided great value – he knew the industry and was able to leverage contacts and tap in to a good distributor network. It would be challenging to build a customer base in North America without a good local contact.
My suggestion for other Irish companies seeking to enter the Canadian market would be to make the most of every chance you get! The local reference site is key. Enterprise Ireland provides tremendous support and is very helpful. Make sure to research ahead of time and tailor the platform or product to address the Canadian format including ‘look and feel’. To overcome the hesitancy of potential customers to go with an overseas company, demonstrate your flexibility to customize; listen and respond to their demands, use examples of adaptations made when you entered other countries. The small timing difference with Europe being ahead of Canada can also be useful for timely issue resolution. “
Canada Sample 
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