Media

Empowerment firm buys 20% stake in DataPro

Tue, 16 January 2007
Thabiso Mochiko

Business Report

Johannesburg - DataPro had sold a 20 percent stake to private equity firm Lereko Metier Capital Growth Fund for R120 million, the AltX-listed telecommunications company said yesterday. The transaction will raise DataPro's black economic empowerment (BEE) shareholding to 25.1 percent. DataPro's other black partner is Vantage Capital Fund Managers. Lereko Metier Capital Growth Fund is a private equity fund venture between Metier Group and Lereko, which is headed by former North West premier Popo Molefe and former environmental affairs minister Mohammed Valli Moosa. The fund invests on behalf of institutional shareholders and targets equity investments of up to R400 million in private and public companies.

Lereko Metier's purchase will be effective after DataPro's R380 million acquisition of Orion Telecom, the least cost routing and callback communications specialist, has been bedded down. The Orion transaction was announced in November and was approved by the competition commission last week. The remaining conditions for the deal to be finalised are shareholder approval and the completion of debt and equity capital raising. Orion is 56 percent owned by Mogala Investments and 30.7 percent by the Arch Equity investment fund. Its managers hold the rest.

The Orion Telecom deal will double DataPro's annual turnover to R1.2 billion and increase its staff to 410. DataPro provides voice over internet services, least cost routing and internet services to consumers and corporate businesses, mainly in southern Africa. Group executive chairman Tony van Marken said the increase in empowerment shareholding was in line with the group's strategy to meet BEE requirements in the public sector, where Orion Telecom had a significant business, "so that we can maintain and grow our base of business".

Orion's clients include provincial governments, municipalities, the SA National Defence Force and the SA Police Service. Lereko Metier chief executive Thierry Dalais said Metier Group already had a significant shareholding in DataPro and had worked closely with the company on acquisitions and growth strategies. "The fund is ideally positioned to partner entrepreneurially driven management groups … and this investment opportunity fits our strategy." DataPro shares were unchanged at R1.05 yesterday.

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