Johannesburg — LONG-suffering technology group Business Connexion aims to double its operating profit from 4% to 8% within the next three years to get its figures pumping.

A revitalisation programme to overhaul the company is already paying off, with results for the year to May 31 all heading in the right direction. Its shares responded buoyantly yesterday, rising 9% to temporarily trade at 520c.

Revenue rose 16% from R3,5bn to R4,1bn and headline earnings climbed 17% from R97,7m to R115m, while headline earnings a share rose 18% from 37,5c to 44,3c. The net profit was down from R167m to R128m, however, as last year's figures had benefited from the sale of some properties.

The results were merely "satisfactory", said CEO Benjamin Mophatlane, and there was still plenty of work to do.

Mophatlane has survived the roasting he received six months ago when he presented the interim results, which had analysts asking whether he was the right man to lead the business. Yesterday, he retaliated with sounder figures and larger ambitions. The second half of the year had shown stronger results than the first half as the overhaul took effect, he said, but : "It's not the moment to declare victory; we have a lot of work ahead."

One part of the overhaul which illustrates the state the company was in is a move to liquidate dormant subsidiaries -- all 65 of them.

Despite the continuing overhaul, the company declared a dividend of 18c and a special dividend of 60c.

Mophatlane said the prospects were promising as corporate customers were still investing in technology goods and services that Business Connexion could sell them. Its outsourcing services would be kept busy as a shortage of technicians saw companies opting to hire specialised technology players to run their IT operations for them.

More work was also expected as the government accelerated its IT spending, and Business Connexion's credible empowerment profile positioned it nicely to win that work, Mophatlane said. One bottleneck was the telecommunications industry, where companies would be spending more if liberalisation was happening more rapidly.

On the home front, cost-cutting steps capped the growth in operating expenses to 9,7% over last year's costs, well below the growth rate of its revenue. But implementing the revitalisation plan bore a cost of its own, which partly offset the savings being achieved, said chief financial officer Marius Schoeman.

Achieving an operating margin of 4% was the first milestone given that it had previously been just 2,1%, Schoeman said, yet the full benefits of the overhaul would not be seen until 2011.

Goals towards increasing its profit margin involve focusing on clients that were growing in industries that were also growing, and working on new products and services to sell them.