Paris, 31 October 2006: Business & Decision, the international consulting and data engineering company, specialising in Business Intelligence, Customer Relationship Management and E-Business, today announced consolidated sales turnover of €34.5m for the 3rd quarter of 2006 (from 1 July to 30 September), a 61% increase on the comparative period from 2005.
The Group’s 3rd quarter results for this financial year reflect organic growth of more than 32%.
Since being listed on the Euronext Paris in 2001, Business & Decision has continued to prosper, with an average growth of 32.7% each year for the last 5 years.
In comparison with the market indicators for the IT software and services market, Business & Decision has again outperformed the growth estimations set by Syntec Informatique (which were between 6.5%-7.5% for 2006).
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Reaching this €100m milestone is a reflection of the growth of the Business & Decision Group over the last year. The excellence of our team and our service offerings has meant we have retained our leadership position in the areas of Business Intelligence, Customer Relationship and E-Business. We expect to see further growth throughout 2007, especially in our activities outside of France”, commented Patrick Bensabat, Chairman, Business & Decision.
Strong International Growth
Business & Decision continues to strategically invest in its international activities, in order to continue its growth. International activities contributed €13.7m to the Group’s consolidated turnover for the 3rd quarter (which represents 39.7%). Additionally the 12 regions outside of France experienced organic growth of more than 34%.
This 3rd quarter was marked by the acquisition of the Swiss consulting and engineering company
SyBOR, which will strengthen Business & Decision’s presence in Switzerland and generate more than €6m in turnover throughout 2007.
Looking towards 2008, the Business & Decision Group plans to pursue the same dynamism in its international development and exploit the potential of its key activities.
Reinforced Leadership Status in Areas of Core Expertise
Business & Decision has maintained its high levels of turnover and has set ambitious objectives for the coming months. The Group’s performance was recently acknowledged in “Europe’s 500”, where it was ranked in the top 100 European companies largely due to its employment opportunities and its sales turnover for 2002-2005.
Business Intelligence, the cornerstone service offering from Business & Decision, generated a growth of 64.7% for the 3rd quarter. This represented 68% of the Group’s consolidated sales turnover.
Customer Relationship Management saw strong growth (31.8%), and represented 16% of the 3rd quarter’s turnover.
E-Business represented 16% of sales turnover for the 3rd quarter, and saw an increase of 80.8% against the comparative period from 2005.
Renewed Confidence in its Annual Objectives
Business & Decision has reaffirmed its target of 50% growth, compared to 41% for the previous year. This equates to a turnover of €140m for the financial year of 2006. To support this strong organic growth, Business & Decision initiated an ambitious recruitment strategy for 2006 and by the end of the year will have recruited 600 new employees to strengthen all areas of expertise within the Group.
About Business & Decision
Business & Decision is an international consulting and data engineering company that specialises in providing solutions and related consultancy in Business Intelligence, Customer Relationship Management and E-Business. The Group offers solutions designed to improve the business performance of organisations and enhance their decision-making capabilities (setting up platforms for reporting, financial dashboards, corporate performance management, etc.); optimises the processes associated with customer relationship management (sales force automation, call centres, customer database management, analytical CRM) and delivers a variety of e-business solutions (web portals, e-Commerce, knowledge management, open source integration, etc.).
With more than 1,700 employees worldwide, Business & Decision has developed a ‘compete project approach’ ranging from consulting to implementation. The Group has a reputation for its functional and technical expertise and has forged partnerships with all of the key technology vendors. Today, Business & Decision has more than 1,200 clients including Dutch customers as ABN Amro Bank, AGIS zorgverzekeringen, Albert Heijn, Avero Achmea, Centraal beheer Achmea, Corus, Delta Lloyd Bank, Gerkens Cacao, Interfinance, LeasePlan corporation and Trias Zorgverzekeringen.
Business & Decision has been listed on the Euronext Paris since 6 February 2001 (Compartment C / ISIN code FR 00000 7895 8 / BND) and appears in the NextEconomy segment an on the IT-Cac (technology market).
For more information visit
www.businessdecision.com.
Press Contact:
John Simmerman
Business & Decision Netherlands BV
Tel: 020 580 67 30
Fax: 020 580 67 39
E-mail:
john.simmerman@businessdecision.com