Technology CEO of the Year: Laércio Cosentino – Programmer for Performance

SÃO PAULO – TOTVS is one of the hottest software companies in South America, yet CEO Laércio Cosentino chose the site of a former Benedictine monastery to set up headquarters, miles from the high-rise technology hubs of the flashier Berrini and Vila Olímpia districts.
It was a homecoming of sorts for Cosentino, who grew up in the Jardim São Bento neighborhood, in the northern section of São Paulo where TOTVS is now based in a modest three-story structure. “The idea was to create an area where TOTVS would stand out,” he said. Cosentino also built an environmentally friendly headquarters and avoided cutting down trees around the building.
Cosentino, 48, still retains the low-key manner of the computer programmer that he once was. He is soft-spoken and maintains a low profile. But in recent years, he has systematically led his company to the top of the management software industry, both in Brazil and in Latin American markets, snapping up competitors on the road to growth. The company is now the largest business software company in the region.
Cosentino’s talents were recognized – and rewarded – early on. “I had a meteoric career rise,” Cosentino acknowledged.
While completing his engineering degree at the University of São Paulo, he joined the local computer software company Siga in the late 1970s as a trainee. It worked out so well, he was promoted every year and became a partner within five years. “It was a small company. But I felt there was a lot that could be done,” he recalled.
At the time, Microsoft’s Bill Gates was predicting that there would be a PC in every home. Cosentino started thinking about the opportunities among small- and medium-sized businesses and enlisted the help of his boss, Ernesto Haberkorn, who is still his partner today. Together, they set up a new company, Microsiga Software Company, to focus on management software for smaller companies in Latin America.
Cosentino and Haberkorn divided Brazil into 44 sales territories and pursued each aggressively. “If we didn’t do it, someone else would do it,” Cosentino said.
Cosentino is prone to radical changes and decided to stop working on software development like others quit smoking: abruptly. “You need to do a kind of big bang” sometimes, he said. “The company was growing and I had to be the strategy guy and lead the company.”
The year was 1993 and under Cosentino’s guidance, Microsiga steadily began to pursue acquisitions in Brazil. A number of the deals were financed by the U.S. private equity fund, Advent. Later financial support came from the Brazilian National Development Bank (BNDES), which made software a pillar of Brazil’s industrial policy.
Over the past five years, the company consolidated its burgeoning software empire by buying up its three main competitors: Logocenter in 2005, followed by RM Sistemas in 2006 and archrival Datasul in 2008. It went public in March 2006, changing its name to TOTVS and raising $213 million on the Brazilian stock exchange.
With the Datasul deal, Cosentino has sought to shed his image of corporate conqueror in favor of that of a unifier. After the deal closed, he sought to win the hearts and minds of Datasul employees by visiting the company’s seven locations in 48 hours, carrying a white flag. “It was a symbol of peace,” Cosentino explained.
All the Datasul staff signed the flag as a gesture of goodwill, and the merger of Datasul and TOTVS was completed in a record 45 days.
Revenue at TOTVS climbed almost 41 percent from 2007 to 2008, hitting $259 million, while profits rose almost 50 percent to $25 million. In the first quarter of 2009, revenue was $120 million and profits were $15 million.
Lately Cosentino has found a creative outlet in cuisine. He has set up a gourmet area at company headquarters, sometimes preparing his favorite dish of cod fish and Portuguese cheese for clients.
“Cooking is a sort of alchemy,” Cosentino said. “It’s a form of entrepreneurship as well, that is creation.”
But he plans more acquisitions for the future as he tries to make TOTVS the leading company in developing management software for the region and maintain its global competitive edge. And no, he does not plan to return to computer software programming.