Press Releases Feb. 19, 2001

US-Based Qualex Appointed VAR for BI-Ninja
Martinsville, Virginia—(Business Wire)—Feb. 19, 2001— Qualex Consulting Services Inc., a US-based SAS Alliance Gold Member, has been appointed a Value Added Reseller for Ninja, a state-of-the-art packaged OLAP tool for SAS business users.

The deal has been concluded as part of South African-based InfoActive’s strategy to recruit a global network of Value Added Resellers to distribute and service Ninja to all existing and potential users of SAS.

Director of InfoActive, John Day, explains the reason for their selection: “In order to address the full potential of the US market, we needed to form a relationship with a US-based company who has a national presence. Qualex has a reputation for quality and delivery, and its offices throughout the US make it ideally suited to distribute, implement and support a product such as Ninja. Qualex also offers a full range of SAS implementation skills and services.”

According to Clive J. Pearson of Qualex, this will enhance their offerings to clients with the opportunity to include this state-of-the-art OLAP tool. “It will further leverage the client’s investment in SAS technology and reduce the development time to implement a robust analysis and reporting application.”

Founded in 1995, Qualex currently employs over 35 highly skilled SAS consultants and its many projects have been mostly at Fortune 500 companies.

“We look forward to working closely with InfoActive to promote and deploy numerous highly successful Ninja implementations. We feel as two highly regarded SAS organizations, our association will provide a winning combination for both companies, SAS and most importantly, our clients,” says Pearson.

Developed by Pioneer Software in New Zealand, Ninja provides SAS users with a world-class front-end to the full range of SAS capabilities with zero programming effort. Ninja offers a comprehensive feature list which rivals other off-the-shelf OLAP suites, including features such as tracking facilities, allowing users to optimize the performance of underlying data structures. This tool can be plugged in and information can be accessed within days or even hours of installation.

Evolved in close consultation with business use in every major industry sector, the resulting product “thinks as a business person would, with the flexibility to meet all the most common OLAP business requirements.”