Company Background

Yesterday

SERKO Ltd founders Bob Shaw and Darrin Grafton originally developed the
business to fill a gap in the domestic retail travel market. Both quickly saw the opportunity to take their technology international. 

Within just five years of launching, SERKO (the company's software brand) took 60 per cent of the New Zealand corporate market share and achieved significant sales success in overseas markets.

In 1998 Gullivers Pacific invested in the company and in late 2004, with the float of Gullivers Travel Group (GTG) on the New Zealand stock exchange, SERKO became a wholly owned subsidiary of GTG.

Today

The Company is now independently owned by the original founders including a group of private equity partners, which enhances the organisations ability to meet the growing demand for an agile approach to travel technology solutions.

In 2004 the DeLoitte's Fast 500 growth survey ranked SERKO as eighth fastest growing company in New Zealand.
The same year SERKO was ranked Number One Travel Industry Firm in Deloitte's Unlimited Fast 50.

SERKO currently markets direct to the travel industry and corporate users of the travel industry throughout New Zealand and Australia, and has established a successful and growing market share and presence with its base products.
The company is proud to be recognized as a market leader and major player within the travel industry throughout New Zealand and Australia.

Today SERKO can lay claim to a broad portfolio of products specifically developed and available to the travel industry and corporate users of the travel industry. The  SERKO® Travel Management Systems range includes: SERKO® Corporate, SERKO® Retail and SERKO® Online.

In recent years this go-getter company has won a whole stream of awards.
Six major technology achievements have been awarded for SERKO's innovations and the company is the only Australasian company to win the prestigious Microsoft US Award for Best E-Commerce solution in the Asia-Pacific region. SERKO can boast the first Windows-based software for the travel industry.

SERKO has also received a technology commendation from the NZ government.  In addition to this prestigious accolade, the NZ Government has also awarded the company grants, totalling $2 million, for research and development.

Today, more than sixty per cent of all corporate travel agencies in New Zealand book via SERKO travel management systems.

SERKO continues to expand the SERKO® suite and its most recently released product, SERKO® Online, for the first time puts real-time online travel management in the hands of corporate travel administrators - while remaining fully integrated with multiple Global Distribution Systems (GDS's), which are used by travel agents around the globe.

SERKO now has nearly 45  staff working from its Auckland offices.

The company's founders are understandably proud of their home-grown success story:
"There's nothing that can match SERKO in the Asia/Pacific region, and through some major deals, we're being used on a global basis by some of the world's largest companies. This is a great success for a home-grown product," says Bob Shaw.

Tomorrow

EXPORT EXPANSION

With SERKO's success in the Australasian market, SERKO is poised to expand into much larger markets around the world.
SERKO's first export market was Australia, which continues to show dramatic growth.  The company is establishing a hub in Singapore, which will be a stepping-stone into South East Asia.
SERKO will then plan its entry into the big UK and USA markets.
The company regularly receives inquiries from the USA, UK, Singapore, Philippines, Japan, South Africa and Dubai regarding its current products and services.

SERKO is now poised to establish a worldwide presence, and looks set to next focus on the United States of America and the United Kingdom.
Much of what the SERKO team does now is innovative, highly productive, and capable of achieving very good results.  The SERKO management team is now putting systems in place to meet the new challenge of international marketing and fulfillment.

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT

SERKO is committed to continue its substantial commitment to development of the product line through investing as much as 50 per cent of sales revenue each year back into R&D.

With a sizeable chunk of sales revenue going into research and development and with the company's imminent entry into global markets, the future is looking bright.

The company expects to keep expanding and bringing in new products to meet industry needs and encourage more corporate people to do their own travel planning.

SERKO's staff are highly skilled in E-Commerce technology, which was used to create SERKO® Online.  The company is now using that increased E-Commerce capability to develop further leading-edge products for the travel industry.