Kathy Gibson reports from Sage Future for Partners in Amsterdam – The African market is the leading region for Sage’s human resources (HR) and payroll solutions.
Sage has more than 65 000 HR and payroll customers in Africa and the Middle East, and is represented in 44 African countries.
A massive 13-million payslips are generated from Sage solutions every month in South Africa.
Jordaan Burger, MD of Sage South Africa, says the Sage 300 People product is an important and strategic part of the company’s product mix in South Africa.
“Most employed people in South Africa have, at one point, received a Sage payslip. We are by far the biggest payroll in the region.”
In fact, in South Africa, Sage is more often recognised for its payroll solutions than for its accounting.
“And we are still market leaders, with the biggest share by far at close to 60%,” Burger says.
Having said that, he adds that the market was bigger in the past, when there were fewer competitors.
“I am confident that we have phenomenal products, and will not only retain our market leadership, but become even more competitive.”
Sage’s overriding theme going into 2027 is confidence, and Nathi Mbulumeti, HR and payroll sales director at Sage, is confident that the investments the company is making in 300 People will boost the product’s positioning.
“The product is very configurable, and the core modules now offer more from an HR point of view,” he says.
This is important, as HR staff often have different priorities from the payroll people. But customers are looking for systems that bring fragmented systems together to accelerate their time to value.
Business partners and technology partners are key to creating customer-specific solutions on the Sage platform, Mbulumeti says.
Business partner LSP Inc is testament to the success of this strategy.
Sales director Clarissa Fick van Rhyn shares that her company lost a big customer a year or so back.
“But we brought them back with Sage 300 People, and the stability it offers,” she says.
Having moved off Sage, the customer experienced significant general ledger failures, and the consistency offered by 300 People gave LSP Inc the opportunity to repitch for the business.
Fick van Rhyn is full of praise for the product’s quality – and the fact that it allows payroll partners to start moving into the HR space.
“The mobile application is a real game changer,” she enthuses. “We also like the open APIs, so we can plug in any external source.
“Overall, I don’t see other products competing easily.”
Fred von Biljon, senior director product: human capital management (HCM) at Sage, adds that the mobile app is entirely new technology, not just a reskin of the existing system. “The feedback we are getting is very positive, and it has a high satisfaction rating.”
Mobile app assistance has also been introduced in the last few months.
Sage has refreshed the look and feel of the Web interface, and is incrementally adding self-service features.
The company has also introduced the first AI capabilities in Sage 300 People, making it more modern and giving employees more insight on payroll.
“These big ticket items have helped to change the trajectory of Sage 300 People,” Von Biljon says.
Going into 2027, he explains that a lot of work is taking place at the core of the product, rather than just on the user experience.
First, and most important, is an ongoing focus on security. “We are getting more and more questions from infosec teams – and the complexity of these questions is increasing,” Von Biljon says. “The importance of security is extremely high.”
In response, Sage is increasing its bug bounty, adding security certifications. By December this year it will be certified as SOC type 1, and will be able to progress to SOC type 2 within the year.
Sage isn’t neglecting the user experience. It aims to make Sage 300 People more scalable, with increased database efficiency and modernised components.
Partners will also be able to add their own agentic solutions. An AI gateway will give them access to the platform, and allow them to use their own large language models (LLMs). AI is also at the heart of helping partners deliver solutions at speed.
“We are investing in a holistic product development lifecycle – from payroll to workforce transformation,” Von Biljon adds.