Premium 6 January 2014, 10:40am

A unique corporate culture (x)

PR cikk

When we read about multinational companies with a pleasant flavor, where our workplace is characterized by a snooker table and the atmosphere of coffee shops, one begins to think that if only see an example of it in real life, not in a Hollywood movie. But we don’t have to travel far away for that example, just pop out to the 13th district of Budapest.

The Liferay way Easily accessible and usable open-source programs in Hungary have gained popularity and confidence in less than a decade. Open source has become the mainstream in which most of the IT companies are required to join, but finally just a few have managed to exceed the standard and distinguish themselves among the top performers globally. Liferay is one of them. The Netherlands, Great Britain, Russia, now Hungary have embraced and supported opensource software and introduced and popularized this philosophy. While monitoring the spread of these programs everyone will admit that we can talk about a general tendency, which is increasing exponentially in the European Union and Hungary as well. But cost-efficiency and fostering clear competition is just one of the reasons why open-source softwares are widely supported and popular. It has a virtue that can not be attributed to all of the softwares: its power to create a community. The future itself What is the product then? Building a portal in the 'Liferay-style' is like a puzzle, or lego set. It produces a framework which can be built or integrated with any current or future system and easily developed - according to experts. This means for return on investment, a robust system that is up and running quickly, with a seamless transition for old to new, and quick and adaptable user interfaces that increase efficiency within workforces and clients. The product is like an ameba, it is smart and diverse, in addition, you don't have to pay for it at all. Or to be precise: We get the car for free, payments are required in the garage. Open source is the future, the next step of the IT evolution.

Development community reflects the needs The American software company, Liferay - which owns a subsidiary in Hungary - emphasized this community-creating power and gained benefits. The company realized the opportunity, which stems from putting users first: by developing active user communities the company can be closer to clients and also developers, because cooperation with these communities contributes to the development and success of the product. They develop the parts voted by the community. Expanding Budapest HQ Liferay established in 2002 gained momentum quickly and reached a staff of 450 people and now is represented in 18 countries. Their products are used by more than 700.000 companies, and accessible by 85 providers through out the world. The most popular product of Liferay is a free community portal software, which has a licensed version for companies supporting the framework for intranet and internet based interactions. Serving the growing and diversified needs, Liferay - beside its professional softwares - provides trainings, consultancy and support for their customers. To meet this need a service center was opened in Hungary in 2004. The Hungarian subsidiary - funded three years ago - Liferay Hungary is operating as a Support Center which means, the Budapest headquarters for customer and technical support serves hundreds of clients all over the world with the help of its 44 staff members. "The reason we chose Hungary was because of their top notch education for engineers, stability of currency and infrastructure, and because their language proficiency in English is better than in some of the traditional centers for support." - added the specialist. Building on passion - internal and external community construction

According to Enikő Szemán, the HR executive of Liferay Hungary, corporate culture is as important as its business model, considering the success of company. Liferay builds on passion and is proud of our enthusiastic workers. "We are the company, where our colleagues work and create from their heart, beside they feel and appreciate to be part of a family. Maybe it's a bit odd, but at our company resignations and layoffs are both rare. We have a plan to expand our staff in 2014 too, by hiring programmers at first." - added Enikő Szemán. Fruit of hard work The difficulties of the unique structure and pioneering company model have finally shown a return: the products of Liferay are used by such a giants as Allianz, Benetton, Cisco Systems, Lufthansa, T-Mobile, Vodafone, and companies Mavir, Raiffeisen Bank, Fundamenta on the Hungarian market. Besides, the UN and the French Ministry of Defense is satisfied with the softwares of Liferay. In addition, professional organizations also admit Liferay's success, rewarding this success with several awards. Liferay was put on the list of the 100 most influential and innovative companies in 2006, InfoWorld named Liferay Portal the "Best Open Source Portal" on the market. Finally numerous awards brought a golden recognition that include: Liferay was positioned by prestigious research company Gartner Inc. in the Leaders Quadrant of the Magic Quadrant for horizontal portals in 2013, becoming part of an exclusive group with companies like IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP. (x)