‘Computer Warehouse Group holds potentials to become next Google’

Austin Okere, founder/CEO, Computer Warehouse Group (CWG) plc, has noted that the company has the potentials to become the next Google, given the business prospects of her new business model, CWG 2.0.

The CWG boss made this point while addressing the company’s shareholders at the ninth annual general meeting (AGM), which held last week in Lagos.

Addressing shareholders, Willie Belonwu, chairman, CWG, noted that “the results which showed strong and positive performances across all financial indices also confirmed the company’s position as the foremost Pan African ICT services provider.”

According to Okere, CWG 2.0 is a subscription business model and driven by the quest to help Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) grow and make notable social impact. This includes Openshopen, a website that affords shop owners open their own virtual store online and SMERP, an enterprise resource planning solution that will help business owners manage their business inventories on a subscription basis.

In reference to the future of the company, Belonwu noted that CWG plans to further tap into the growth potentials of emerging African economies, through the provision of cloud based IT solutions, in the bid to attain her vision to be the number 1 IT utility enabler in Africa.

The company’s financial scorecard showed revenues grew by 10 percent while profit after tax increased by a 81 percent, showing strong efficiency of operations.

The result revealed a Return on Equity of 13 percent in 2013, as against 11 percent in 2012, and Returns on Capital Employed (ROCE) of 13 percent, against 7 percent in 2012.

The company’s asset increased by N2 billion to N13.4 billion as of 2013 year end, while shareholders’ equity increased by 66 percent to N5 billion in the same period. The company finished with a strong cash position of over N1.1 billion at the year end, with a 38 percent increase in cash from operation over 2012. Shareholders at the meeting gave approval for the board to pay 8 kobo dividends per share. The event also witnessed the election of Emmanuel Ijewere to the board of directors as a non-executive director.

According to him, Openshopen will allow business owners to open their own online virtual stores which will give their businesses visibility leverages. “If a buyer searches for a shop that sells spare parts in your location online, for example, he can get to see your store address and get to buy from you without any stress, if you have registered your presence online” he said.

Moreover, the solution will democratise domain possession and give Micro, Small and Medium business owners the platform to compete with known online stores at cheaper rates.

Okere also pointed out that these solutions will have significant social impacts on the society. According to him, there are about 17.7 million Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) in Nigeria. “With their own online stores and with the aid of enterprise resource planning, we will empower SMEs to be able to keep their own records.

Then, they can present their records to get credits from the banks. With these loans, they can be able to expand their businesses. If they are able to expand their businesses, each of them can employ one more person. If each of them employs one more person, we will end up creating 17.7 million more jobs. The unemployment rate in Nigeria is about 23 percent, which amounts to about 16 million jobless youths. With this development, we will eradicate unemployment and have more jobs to spare” he added.

The advent of CWG 2.0 has positioned us to be next Google or Facebook and make significant global impact. And this vision is attainable because our solutions are not only profitable but they are repeatable, scalable and sustainable, he said.