Group 5 ready for Zimbabwe

"We have a company registered there. It's been dormant for a while, but certainly we're ready to go into Zimbabwe," CEO Mike Upton told Reuters in a telephone interview.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is currently in talks with opposition leaders on a power-sharing deal mediated by President Thabo Mbeki.

Group Five posted a 71 percent jump in full-year diluted headline earnings per share on Monday and its revenue for the year to end-June increased by 15 percent to R8.9bn.

Construction firms like Group Five, Murray & Roberts and Aveng have benefited from an infrastructure boom in Africa's biggest economy driven in part by development ahead of the 2010 soccer World Cup, which has helped them shrug off a broader economic slowdown.

Upton said Group Five was focusing on growing its business in commodities, oil and gas in Africa's private sector. The company operates in more than 18 countries on the continent, which contribute a third of its construction revenue.

He added that the group also saw growth potential in the Middle East, where it currently operates in the public sector.

"That (Africa, Middle East) is a very buoyant market for us. We're probably executing R2bn worth of power projects ourselves," Upton said.

Group Five has six open-cycle gas turbine projects in these regions, and also expects to be involved in energy projects with Eskom, Upton said.

Eskom, which produces about 95 percent of the country's electricity, faced a crisis in January when the national grid virtually collapsed, forcing key gold and platinum mines shut, and plunging millions into darkness.

Upton was upbeat for 2009 and said Group Five expects to achieve further strong earnings growth for its new financial year.

- Reuters