{"id":25857,"date":"2012-11-06T09:58:37","date_gmt":"2012-11-06T07:58:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=25857"},"modified":"2012-11-07T07:56:30","modified_gmt":"2012-11-07T05:56:30","slug":"bcx-outlines-africa-growth-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/it-services\/25857\/bcx-outlines-africa-growth-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"BCX outlines Africa growth strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Business Connexion<\/a> CEO, Benjamin Mophatlane<\/a> says the group aims to up its African footprint to a position where it represents almost a third of its earnings within 3-5 years.<\/p>\n

On Monday (5 November), the listed ICT group reported a 35.1% rise in revenue to R5.83 billion for the year ending August 2012, citing a good performance across its entire portfolio.<\/p>\n

The group highlighted growth in key financial metrics as a direct result of its seven-year growth strategy to 2016, which focuses on the group\u2019s cloud services offering, vertical sector solutions, application development and expansion into the rest of Africa.<\/p>\n

Operating profit increased to R275 million, from R157.7 million in 2011, while the group reported diluted headline earnings per share of 38.8 cents, from 17.2 cents, and declared a normal dividend per share of 14 cents, from 23 cents before, along with a special dividend per share of 40.0 cents.<\/p>\n

In a telephone interview with BusinessTech, Mophatlane said that BCX already had operations in African countries including Nigeria, Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia.<\/p>\n

He said that BCX had also done some work in Ghana and would look at adding a presence there, with countries including Angola, Ethiopia, and Zimbabwe also future targets.<\/p>\n

Mophatlane said that Business Connexion\u2019s strategy would be in the form of partnerships and or acquisitions where necessary.<\/p>\n

And while revenue from its business operations outside of South Africa accounted for a little over R420 million in the current reporting period, out of a total of R5.8 billion, Mophatlane said the aim is to drive up that revenue in the mid-long term.<\/p>\n

He said that if BCX could harness 30% of its total earnings outside of South Africa within the next 3-5 years, \u201cwe would be doing very well\u201d.<\/p>\n

Business Connexion said it continued to generate strong cash flows from operations, which increased from R258.5 million in 2011, to R520.8 million.<\/p>\n

\u201cBCX is benefiting from being a larger and more diversified enterprise with an expanded customer base. Cross selling opportunities\u00a0and synergies should contribute positively to future results,\u201d the group said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Related article<\/strong><\/p>\n

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BCX expects full-year earnings boost<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Business Connexion issues cautionary warning<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Business Connexion to target African growth<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Business Connexion lifts revenue by 43.5%<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Business Connexion buys Quad Automation<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Orange to throw hat in SA telecoms ring?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Business Connexion CEO Benjamin Mophatlane says the group aims to up its African footprint to a position where it represents almost a third of its earnings within 3-5 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":10357,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[2457,1031,26,767],"class_list":["post-25857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-it-services","tag-benjamin-mophatlane","tag-business-connexion","tag-headline","tag-ict"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25857"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25965,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25857\/revisions\/25965"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}