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Blue Label lifts revenue to R19.4bn

Johannesburg - Blue Label Telecoms [JSE:BLU] released their results for the year ended May 31 2014 on Wednesday, announcing that gross operating profit increased by R78m to R1.35bn.

"One again we are very proud to present our year end results," joint CEO Brett Levy told Fin24 in an interview.

The telecommunications and transnational services firm posted a revenue jump from R18.9bn to R19.4bn and an increase in operating profit from R645.6m to R722.8m.

"I think us as management is relatively satisfied with what we have done for the year.

"We have achieved many of our goals mainly in distribution and growing our distribution channel in South Africa as well as Mexico and India."

Levy said the group is also expecting the acquisitions of RMCS and Via Media to enhance profitability and to afford it access to new channels of distribution.

Watch: Blue Label hits R1bn gross operating profit


On the international front, the group’s share of losses amounting to R57m was mainly attributable to Blue Label Mexico, but joint CEO Mark Levy explained to Fin24 what the group's international growth strategy is.

"The international business model is to replicate the South African business model in three phases."

He said one is to improve its distribution capability, second is to acquire more customers and the third is to introduce more products and services.

The plan for India is to be a far more aggressive financial services platform focusing on traditional products like airtime and bill payments.

It also aims to introduce two new products in the form of acquiring and money transfers.

"In India what we have seen is that our revenues and our margins from remittances have now surpassed our airtime margins."

Turning to Mexico, Levy said the group's network is growing tremendously.

"We have over 90 thousand points of devices deployed and growing steadily.  

Similarly to India, in Mexico the group focus on distributing airtime and bill payments, but they are also looking at providing enhanced technology such as location based services for banks to detect fraud.

Said Levy: "So for example, if we determine that a person is in Sandton and someone is trying to process a transaction in Delmos, we can alert the banks' fraud department and they can investigate whether it is a fraudulent transaction."

Watch: Blue Label to replicate SA strategy abroad



 - Fin24

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