Making Bricks and Mortar Retail
As Solid As Bricks And Mortar
At redPanda Software we have a decade of experience in developing customised software for the retail and financial industries. Working with clients in South Africa, Africa and the UK, we have built our reputation for producing the highest quality solutions across the following specialised business processes:
Customer Experience
Credit Management
Point of Sale
Insurance
Data Warehousing
Payment Systems
Having built customised enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems from the ground up,
we have vast experience in backend systems, including:
Enterprise Communications Systems
HR Systems
Property management
Vehicle Fleet Management
At redPanda Software we pride ourselves on our product offering; the development of specialist retail enterprise software that focuses on bricks and mortar outlets.
We are extremely proud that over the years, through our consultative approach, we have gained the trust of our long-standing clients by helping them to improve what matters: enhanced and personalised customer experience; operational efficiency; productivity; and marketing feedback.
Having such a positive impact on our clients’ business has been achieved due to a multitude of reasons. Our integrated platform, Connected Solution, consolidates all user interactions, engagements and transactions for a bespoke in-store experience. Plus, our alignment with industry partners allows us to harness the latest global megatrends in the retail space, and our close associations with value added resellers (VARs).
redPanda Software:
Our Values
Growth
At redPanda Software, “Way to Grow” is far more than a tagline. It is part mantra, and part rallying cry that sums up an ethos that all of us at redPanda Software live by on a daily basis. Helping to grow our clients’ business results in growing our business. While helping to grow our employees means growing a vast reservoir of talent and potential.
Relationships
There are two kinds of people that mean the world to us: our clients and our employees. As our client list confirms, they tend to stick around. Moreover, because our company culture revolves around our “Way to Grow” ethos, we believe we have the best staff.
Agility
Few industries are as dynamic, intense and competitive as the retail industry. At redPanda Software we know this intimately because the majority of our top management staff have worked in retail. It is also why we chose to specialise in this industry when we started redPanda Software in 2009: it’s a big advantage for us, and an even bigger advantage for our clients.
Recognition
We were extremely chuffed to win the 2017 Frost & Sullivan Award for Customer Value Leadership in the Enterprise Software for the Retail Market category. However, we are equally excited every time we get a pat on the back from our clients.
Adding Value
Online shopping and e-commerce may be enjoying a massive rise, but there is also a way to buck the current retail trend. Talk to us about our Connected Solution platform which will allow you to create a customer experience inside bricks and mortar retail environments that will rival anything experienced online.
redPanda Leads
The Way
because of the people who
lead redPanda
The people running redPanda are more than well qualified. The combined time they have spent in the retail and software industries adds up to 105 years.
Gareth Hawkey
Group CEO
Gareth Hawkey
Group CEO
Gareth has 25 years of experience within the IT industry and holds an MBA from the University of Cape Town. He has a passion for business, and began his first business while still at school.
Having gained experience as an IT Technician, Service Delivery Manager and Team Lead, Gareth joined the Lewis Group as a Project Manager in 2001. He soon progressed within the organisation, eventually taking on the role of General Manager and becoming a member of the Executive Committee before leaving to co-found redPanda Software in 2009.
Gareth brings strategic business acumen to the redPanda Software team as Group CEO. His detailed understanding of and ability to identify process efficiencies allows him to guide business and software development to achieve the best results.
With a love for the magic that happens when technology and business meet, Gareth’s drive as redPanda Software’s CEO is to make software development and support easy and predictable for enterprise businesses, and change the landscape of custom software development for the global retail industry.
Leon Coetzer
Managing Director – UK
Leon Coetzer
Managing Director – UK
Leon holds both a Computer Systems diploma and an Enterprise Architect qualification. He has more than 20 years of experience in the software industry, with extensive experience in enterprise software development.
Prior to joining redPanda Software, Leon was a Senior Development Manager, working closely at an executive level with various corporate companies. Through this involvement, he gained an intimate appreciation of the workings of large corporates.
Leon has a strong background in implementing and improving the full systems development cycle (SDLC), with a preference for agile methodologies and tools, and technical abilities in architecting and overseeing projects using a wide range of technologies and frameworks.
Responsible for strategy and operations in the UK, Leon brings a unique blend of technical and business knowledge to the redPanda Software team.
Gerhard Nortje
Operations Director
Gerhard Nortje
Operations Director
Gerhard Nortje has over 20 years’ experience in the retail industry, of which 13 years are in the retail IT space.
With a qualification in business analysis, Gerhard started his career in retail operations. He worked his way up through the ranks to Internal Auditor in Africa’s biggest furniture retailer before joining the IT department to oversee the build and implementation of a new ERP system.
This led to a career change from operations to software development where he used his retail operations background and analytical thinking to develop retail solutions.
Gerhard joined redPanda Software in 2017 because of their shared belief in producing high-quality work for clients with honesty and integrity. Believing in collaboration to solve issues and unlocking potential, Gerhard shares redPanda Software’s belief in continuous growth for both his colleagues and clients.
As Business Development Manager, Gerhard focuses on enhancing current client engagement, product development and new client acquisition. His role also includes establishing new teams and processes to grow both redPanda Software and their clients’ business.
Julian Weber
Sales Manager
Julian Weber
Sales Manager
Having gained experiences in both IT and retail across a number of roles over 20 years, Julian joined redPanda Software at its inception in 2009.
With a passion for service delivery and people, each day is about building new relationships and reinforcing existing ones.
Julian’s strengths lie in building connections with people, his deep understanding of the client’s business needs, and the ability to interpret these and provide solutions to enable a business to perform successfully.
Since joining redPanda Software, Julian has been an integral part of the team in both software and business development. As the Sales Manager, he is responsible for growing brand awareness and overall business through his passion for customer satisfaction and understanding the client’s needs.
Allan Dickson
Non-Executive Chairman
Allan Dickson
Non-Executive Chairman
Allan has more than forty years of experience in the IT industry and holds qualifications in Economics from the University of KwaZulu-Natal and Information Resource Management from the Harvard Business School.
He has a proven track record of delivering major IT-driven transformation in the South African retail and banking sectors and has been particularly effective in building ‘bridges’ between IT and the user communities it serves.
Allan is one of the most experienced Retail Systems people in South Africa. Having held executive roles at Edgars, SPL, Standard Bank, Woolworths, and Ellerines, Allan’s experience and wealth of knowledge led him to take a new path as an independent consultant in 2009.
Allan adds gravitas to the entrepreneurial fleet-footed executive team at redPanda Software and regularly shares his experience and expertise in strategic, project and operational management with them. As a recognised expert in building capability and releasing capacity in organisations and people, Allan is an invaluable asset to the redPanda Software group.
Quentin Barnard
Technical Director
Quentin Barnard
Technical Director
Quentin has over 20 years of experience in the IT and IoT space. He has a passion for new technology, being able to drive technological change and to see these technologies being implemented in the business environment. He previously held the position of Chief Technology Officer before taking up this new role.
Prior to joining redPanda Software, Quentin worked for a Port Elizabeth-based renewable energy company, where he was responsible for electronic design, including hardware, firmware and software integration, digitisation of water and electricity metres, and remote monitoring of several types of devices such as inverters, charge controllers, battery balancer and monitors - a precursor to today's world of the Internet of Things.
He started off his career as an IT consultant with Business Connexion, working across a myriad of industries. He then took on the role of software developer with one of his clients, a financial services company in East London, working his way up to senior software developer, and then IT Manager. He was promoted to Director and later, Chief Information Officer (CIO) when the company listed on the JSE.
Quentin has extensive experience in the retail space and took up the opportunity to return to the IT and IoT environment, as well as work with large clients, and even international clients, by joining redPanda Software.
Way to grow talent
Having grown into a thriving custom software development company, we realised an opportunity to play our part in solving two increasing problems in South Africa: youth employment and the scarcity of young developers entering the industry.
We have thus launched our redPanda Software Developer Internship Programme, in which we take on up to ten interns annually.
By providing the platform to develop the required skills, coupled with mentorship from our most experienced developers, redPanda interns receive the grounding they need to propel themselves into highly successful, rewarding and satisfying careers.
To achieve this, we provide practical training and hands-on experience in all relevant toolsets and programming languages. We also instil in our interns the insights that differentiate our software development methodology.
Moreover, we convey all this learning through our ‘Way to Grow’ ethos. A company-wide vision that revolves around the values we believe matters most in the development of software: curiosity, creativity and confidence.
The success of our internship programme is such that the vast majority of our interns are offered full-time jobs at redPanda Software on completion of their course.