“Around 30% of our revenue comes from abroad at the moment,” said Irina Socol, president and founder of Siveco.
This year the company hopes to record 15% growth and reach turnover of over EUR70 million, mainly relying on international projects. The company sells its software to 24 countries, but only eight countries generated nearly EUR20 million of the company’s EUR60 million turnover.
“We have a large number of international projects this year, which include development projects with the European Union. The list of countries that the company is working with includes Egypt, Lebanon, Bahrain, Tunisia, Kuwait, Macedonia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, which continue to have a very high potential to develop their IT infrastructure,” Socol said.
In Morocco, for instance, the company signed a EUR10 million contract to develop computerized education nationwide, with a similar project to be implemented in Dubai.
According to Socol, projects conducted with state institutions are the most difficult because they are very complex, and their success is measured in terms of how the client works with the system and of the feedback received.
She mentions contracts such as the EUR4.7 million contract with the Agriculture Payment and Intervention Agency and the contract with the Health Insurance House as examples. Such contracts account for over 40% of the total domestic business. “But there are not as many projects as we would have liked.”
“The Romanian IT&C market has remained the same as last year, worth nearly EUR4 billion. It is a small market and I think efforts need to be made for fast computerization,” said Socol.
Siveco’s plans also include a potential stock exchange listing at some point.
‘We are considering stock exchange listing and are discussing it with the company’s shareholders,” said Socol, without providing further details. She did specify that the listing should take place in Romania. “I think a Romanian company with 1,000 employees should be listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, although foreign stock exchanges such as the London Stock Exchange are tempting. There, we would only be a small Romanian company,” said Socol.
Siveco has been hiring in order to cope with the wave of new contracts signed over several years. Since the beginning of the year, the company’s team has expanded to 1,050 people, most of whom are programmers. The company is set to hire 70 more by the end of the year.
(English version by Daniela Stoican; Editing by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)