Compass was founded in 2012 by now 32-year-old CEO Bjoern Lasse Herrmann, who has a reputation as a startup specialist. Sage's press release did not announce specific plans—in fact it was pretty bare bones. In a prepared statement, Herrmann said, "At Compass we built the largest ecommerce information network empowering merchants to learn from each other." This deal comes on the heels of Sage's purchase of Fairsail, which markets human resource applications.