Ackama Group acquires AI and chatbot company, Prefer

Ackama Group acquires AI and chatbot company, Prefer

20 December 2018

Ackama Group, a technology company based in Wellington, Auckland and Melbourne, have just bought AI and chatbot company Prefer.

Prefer has been around in Wellington for several years, providing services to well known clients such as the Royal Society Te Apārangi, Absolute IT, Madison Recruitment, Smart Payroll and New Zealand Post. The company, including all staff, will move into the Ackama offices in early 2019.

“Prefer’s values and skills align with and complement those of Ackama. The aim of our merger is to focus the Prefer team to spearhead AI and play an important role in the application of it by providing solutions that ensure the social fabric of society is not handed over to the robots” says Prefer founder Martijn Verhoeven.

Martijn brings to the Ackama Group his 25 years’ of experience in growing business and creating and developing smart and innovative solutions for clients.

“It is exciting to be working with the large, multinational team within the Ackama Group and being able to push the innovation envelope for our clients even further.” says Martijn.

This is the third acquisition for Ackama in 2018, following their expansion into Australia after buying Squareweave and the digital arm of Plot Media.

“2018 has been a big year for Ackama, we’ve rebranded, starting a consulting business and acquired three new companies” says Breccan McLeod-Lundy, Ackama Group CEO.

“In 2019 we want to leverage the growth in our business to tackle bigger problems and seize more opportunities to do great work for government and business throughout the Asia Pacific region. We’re not your typical big IT shop - we have all the same robust technical and security practices as them but with a real focus on value (for customers, for organisations, for money) and delivery.”

The growth is already paying off, with recent work for several NZ government clients, such as WorkSafe, Oranga Tamariki, DIA and Statistics NZ, as well as on projects in Vanuatu and Fiji, and on the world’s first ever virtual political summit, for the Climate Vulnerable Forum.

Breccan says, “with our experience, Prefer’s domain knowledge and our practical approach to delivering software solutions, we’re looking forward to creating real organisational value for our clients in 2019. And who knows what we’ll buy next year?”

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