Bull, the only European company offering combined expertise in IT infrastructures IT and complex systems, unveiled ‘BullWay 2013’, its strategic plan for the years 2011 to 2013, along with its associated financial objectives.
The aim of this strategic plan is to position Bull within three years as a European leader in mission-critical digital systems. It capitalizes on its fundamental strengths:
- Its technological expertise, in terms of power and security which represent two of the most pressing current issues for organizations
- Its understanding and experience of growth markets, especially the public sector, defense, finance and telecommunications
- Its long-standing geographic presence in rapidly growing economies, such as Brazil.
In terms of its mid-term financial objectives, Bull is looking to improve its profitability, which is set to almost double in 2013, with EBIT of between €50 and €60 million. Over the same period, the objective is to achieve annual revenues of between €1.35 and €1.45 billion; an organic growth rate around 50% faster than the market.
Philippe Vannier, Bull’s Chairman and CEO, commented: “My aim is that our strategic plan breathes new momentum into the Group, to ensure that Bull is firmly on the path of profitable growth. The exponential growth in the amount of data that has to be processed effectively opens up some very promising opportunities for us. So by making more of our globally-recognized expertise in power and security, our teams will be able to offer our customers solutions and services that will boost their competitiveness. Bull’s profitability, and that of our projects, will underpin our growth and development.”
The strategic plan has four key elements:
- Growth, with renewed momentum in sales, focused around more clearly differentiated offerings and extended partnerships
- Ambition, as Bull strives to be more of a ‘people company’ with an entrepreneurial culture, supported by a Management Pact
- Competitiveness, with even greater commitment to innovation, which will underpinned by a simplification of business processes and greater cost control
- Agility, with the implementation of a new organization structure based on four worldwide Business Lines, each focused on customer needs.
The levers for improving Bull’s performance will come from a focus on:
- Customers’ business activities, by deploying sector-specific expertise that cuts across all four Business Lines, enabling Bull’s competitive advantage to be rapidly mobilized
- Commercial differentiation, with the emphasis on high-potential offerings, particularly Extreme Computing, Security and Cloud Computing
- International business, with the accent on developing the Group’s activities in rapidly growing markets, especially Brazil and Eastern Europe.
Bull will also be paying a great deal of attention to maintaining its financial flexibility, to enable possible complementary acquisitions in growth sectors to be integrated into the Group in the future as appropriate, with the aim of further strengthening the creation of sustainable shareholder value.
The Group’s development plan and the associated financial objectives are based on a consistent scope of business activities, the gradual recovery of the global economy over the coming 12 to 18 months, and the absence of any major structural changes in the parity between major currencies or in government investment policies.
