Transcom Worldwide S.A., one of Europe's leading CRM solutions and call center firms, said net sales for the first quarter of 2005 jumped 20.3 percent to $139.09 million, up from $115.62 million in the year-ago period.
Net income for the same period rose 24 percent to $7.43 million from $6 million in first-quarter 2004. Transcom's success with its near-shore proposition offering low-cost, equal standard solutions across borders is said to have helped.
“I'm particularly pleased with the recent growth in interest of our debt collection business,” Keith Russell, Transcom president/CEO, said in a statement. “We are currently participating in a number of performance trials that we believe will result in significant contracts.”
Transcom's call center in Lithuania won several contracts this year. The contracts include businesses involved in airline baggage handling, hotel reservations, telecoms and ferry booking reservations.
Another win was a new debt collection contract in the Italian electricity sector. Transcom is in similar trials with potential clients in banking, agricultural, communications and automotive.
The Lithuanian call center competes directly with Indian CRM firms offering English-language phone services in Britain. Transcom aims to double the number of call center seats serving the British market sometime this quarter.
Transcom claims its growth in the first quarter defies the pricing pressure on the CRM industry, which suffered lower average prices in the first quarter compared with last year.
The company intends to continue cutting costs. Plans call for implementing a margin-enhancement strategy, building higher-margin activities and expanding the debt collection business. Transcom's outlook for the rest of the year is positive.
“There are a number of substantial business opportunities in the sales pipeline requiring pan-European and multilingual capabilities that Transcom can provide,” the company said. “Transcom continues to seek acquisitions, focusing on companies that will provide geographic expansion into new country markets or accelerate the expansion of the debt collection business.”
Mickey Alam Khan covers Internet marketing campaigns and e-commerce, agency news as well as circulation for DM News and DMNews.com. To keep up with the latest developments in these areas, subscribe to our daily and weekly e-mail newsletters by visiting www.dmnews.com/newsletters
