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Unbelievable... 25 years ago we started out as a couple, today we are an established consultancy and software company.
Once Upon a time ...
The AIC Group was founded 25 years ago as Active Information Concept in Lüneburg – at a time when the term business intelligence was still unknown and the business area was called data warehousing. Dialogue marketing was carried out manually by experts in database marketing, and marketing automation was considered an unattainable vision. Today, all these things are taken for granted as if they had always existed.
However, this development has taken place over many years – a development that we as the AIC Group have actively accompanied and enriched with our ideas. Today, we operate our software products in the cloud, BI and data science have been supplemented by generative AI, and topics such as hyper-intelligence and big data have long been a reality. These and many other topics will continue to determine the direction and mission of the AIC Group in the coming years. The future remains exciting and continues to promise innovation and diversity.
1999
25 years ago: The AIC Group was founded by 2 friends in Lüneburg.
1993
2 friends
Our story begins. Jörg Heydorn and Ralf Stöver are studying together in England and decide to set up their own business later on. It was clear at this point that everything would revolve around data in the future. And so it was to be.
1997
MicroStrategy
We started out together at MicroStrategy in the USA. The topic of data warehousing was still in its infancy and there were only a few evaluation platforms that enabled complex analyses. MicroStrategy is still one of the market leaders today, went public shortly after we started and is now a permanent fixture in the BI market.
1999
1. registered office
Active Information Concept (AIC) is founded in Lüneburg in August 1999. The first projects are launched, focussing on consulting for data management and data analysis. The partnership with MicroStrategy is established and remains an integral part of our range of services. The customer base grows steadily and AIC develops into a renowned partner for BI and marketing automation.
2001
Moving
AIC grows, and the premises in Zeppelinstraße become too small. A move to Johannes-Gutenberg-Straße offers more development potential, so that we still feel at home there today. Our software development in the field of marketing automation is born. Our cloud-based offering for email marketing, push notifications and real-time workflow control is developed with a great deal of pioneering spirit.
2002
CeBIT
The marketing of our Marketing Automation aisuite is launched and presented to the public at CeBIT in Hanover. As an integration partner of MicroStrategy, we present our solutions and hold talks with potential customers. On the fourth day, we spoke to our first customer, which of course we didn’t realise at the time. Not only is the number of employees increasing, but AIC is also developing due to the new areas of responsibility, resulting in new organisational units.
2003
aisuite
The many discussions at CeBIT lead to the first customer contract. The contracts for our aisuite software solution are signed in Carl-Metz-Straße in Karlsruhe, and the foundation stone for our success story is laid.
2005
5 Yearly order
Our BI-Consulting was awarded the 5-year contract for the design and implementation of MicroStrategy in-house training for 20 locations of a leading retail group, from Portugal to Tokyo. Our BI expertise for the MicroStrategy platform and our competence in the retail environment were decisive for the contract.
2007
Locations
In the meantime, AIC has founded two further subsidiaries, so the change of name to today’s AIC Group was a logical step. With offices in Vienna, Ratingen, Darmstadt and Frankfurt, the decision was made in the following years to manage the entire business from Lüneburg.
2010
10 years
We are celebrating our 10th anniversary as a training company. We started successfully back in 2001 with the training of our first employee in the field of application development. Since then, we have regularly trained young people in this field. Some of them have found working at the AIC Group so exciting that they are still a permanent part of the AIC team.
2010
Award
The time was ripe, and we were named Partner of the Year 2010 by our BI partner MicroStrategy. We were delighted when we were presented with the award at the MicroStrategy Symposium in Düsseldorf. Unfortunately, the trophy has not been awarded again since then, so it has remained with this one award for AIC.
2012
Evaluation
Cooperation is an important success factor for the AIC Group. Since 2012, we have been cultivating this with the local business development organisation in order to be able to implement innovative ideas with the support of the state of Lower Saxony and Europe in addition to our operational business. Time and again, there are major projects in which advice and financial support have produced great solutions. This joint approach pays off for us and helps us to repeatedly bring new solutions to market maturity.
2014
Certificate
We have our software certified. As a German software provider, we are re-certified by BiTMi every year.
2016
Best advisor
brandeins and Statista select the best consultants in Germany, and the AIC Group is there for the first time. We received the BEST CONSULTANT award for our work in the BI and marketing retail sector. Since then, we have been able to repeat this award 8 times.’.
2017
Software
We decide to operate our software in the cloud in future. The first module we develop is the email marketing component, which becomes the basis of our Marketing Automation Studio (MAS). Even though we didn’t know what challenges awaited us, we overcame them thanks to our development team and brought an excellent product to market.
2018
Partner
We were looking for the right partner for CSA-certified e-mail distribution and found one in Inxmail. We have been working very successfully with Inxmail since the beginning and are pleased to have a very reliable partner at our side to this day. In 2024, we achieved gold partnership with Inxmail and look forward to many more years of partnership together.
2019
20 years
We have already written 20 years of company history, which we celebrated in style with a company outing to Sankt Peter-Ording. As northern lights, sailing is part of our DNA. That’s why the mottos of the event were beach sailing and buggy surfing. It was really something different, as we are only familiar with sailing with water under the keel. It was great fun for everyone and a fantastic shared experience.
2022
Jury
The AIC Group was honoured by the jury of the Lower Saxony Ministry of Economic Affairs, Labour, Transport and Digitalisation. We received this award for our approach to digitalising customer marketing communication.
2023
Events
Every year we have a summer and a Christmas event. This year, the summer event focussed on physical coordination. The entire team took part in a small golf tournament at Escheburg Golf Club. After a hearty breakfast, the three best AIC golfers were determined by pitching, driving and putting and the trophies were awarded at the barbecue.
2024
New platform
Our software development continues to move towards the cloud and utilises the new Customer Data Platform for our customers. The new workflow component is presented to the first customers as a new editor – a great further development of the previous solution.
2024
25 years
In August, we celebrated 25 years of AIC in the Kunstsaal Lüneburg. Instead of the summer event, there was Lüneburg catering and live music. Our guests enjoyed a great evening, perfectly organised by our event team. We are proud of the last 25 years and grateful for the support of our team, our partners and customers – only together could we achieve this success.
2024
25 years – Our anniversary celebration in Lüneburg
CONTACT DATA
AIC Group GmbH
Johannes-Gutenberg-Straße 3
D-21337 Lüneburg
Tel. +49 4131 40052 – 0
Fax +49 4131 40052 – 10
OUR SERVICES
BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE
Holistic BI consulting. more...
MARKETING AUTOMATION
Customer Journey Management. more...
CONTENT CREATION
Integrated email marketing. more...
CUSTOMER INSIGHTS
Data Driven Decisions. more..
GENERALLY
