‘SA exporters have the edge in Africa’

Doing business in Africa is often fraught with risk, but being fellow-African holds an advantage, says Western Cape entrepreneur, Frank Land. “African countries would prefer to develop business links with South Africa and keep the business in Africa, if reliability of supply, competitive pricing and client relationships are a critical part of the marketing campaign,” says Land, co-founder of award-winning, The Invisible Card Company. In a joint presentation with partner and fellow director, Nico Smuts, to Cape exporters recently, they encouraged members to have an open mind and look past the inherent problems in the African market and to focus on the opportunities. The Somerset Westbased private company specialises in the manufacture and export of a range of secure printed paper products containing variable data such as pin numbers on scratch cards for lotteries, major retail promotions and prepaid phone recharge cards for telecoms. It was recently named the best manufacturing and export company for 2009 in the Western Cape at the annual ABSA/Cape Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry awards ceremony, winning the Transnet Port Terminals Trophy. Neither Land nor Smuts had manufacturing or exporting experience when they started their venture six years ago, but were conscious of the opportunity to tap into the rapidly growing telecoms industry. With start-up capital of less than R1 million, one initial customer and one printing machine, The Invisible Card Company was in profit in its first year of operation and continued to prosper. Today it has three factories, a staff complement of more than 150 and sales of between R50 and R70 million a year, around 95% exported. The early initiative of attending an exporting course at the Cape Regional Chamber gave the team a feel of what needed to be done. “We quickly learned about the vagaries of cross-border trade and the risks involved,” said Smuts. “Exports were critical to us from start-up, not an “add-on” or “nice to have”, and we adopted a holistic approach to co-ordinating marketing and production.” Smuts adds the reason why so few South African companies have entered into similar ventures is because The Invisible Card Company’s products demand exacting standards. Land explains the thinking behind the company’s name is partly because it prints secure data and also because it wanted to remain “below the radar” of competitors at that time.