Celebrating the opening of Coracall Zamo Gwala, chief executive of Trade and Investment KwaZulu-Natal (TIKZN) said that the opening of the call centre was testament to the competitiveness of KwaZulu-Natal's telecommunications and IT sectors, strong skills levels and a strong cultural fit. He said that this important investment was also further evidence that Durban had the potential to become a large call centre hub that could provide valuable employment opportunities for the large numbers of unemployed young people in the region.
Pointing out that KwaZulu-Natal, in particular, and South Africa as a whole was competing for call centre investment with countries in Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and elsewhere in Africa, Gwala said a number of key factors had contributed to bringing Coracall to Durban. These include the availability of office space and good locations to set up call centres, a labour pool that included young people capable of communicating well in English, incentives offered by the national Department of Trade and Industry as well as cultural affinities and compatible time zones.
Coracall chief executive Phil Lightfoot confirmed that as much as 90% of Coracall's clients would be UK based with just a small portion of customers coming from South Africa. The brand, which is also being registered in the UK this month, will be developed on the back of synergies with sister brand Phruit, which is regarded as a UK leader in lead generation, call centre service provision, market research and hot key transfer.
"Coracall contact centres are located in the fastest growing commercial and residential growth markets in the world with the availability of high quality employees that benefit our clients and their service expectations. Most of our client's operate in English speaking countries which is why we have carefully selected the locations for our contact centres, working in stable countries with high levels of literacy, spoken English and investment in the nation's infrastructure," Lightfoot said.
With a telecommunications network that includes the latest in fixed-line, wireless and satellite communication, South Africa has the most developed telecoms network in Africa. Massive infrastructural investment has included the Seacom submarine fibre-optic cable system linking south and east Africa to global networks via India and Europe which was commissioned in July 2009 and the East African Submarine Cable System that links countries along the continent's eastern coast to the rest of the world which was commissioned in late 2010.
Lightfoot said he very strongly believed in re-investment which had accounted for much of sister brand Phruit's international success over the past seven years. Phruit currently has a database covering 35 million consumers and their lifestyle preferences in the UK, 125 million in the US and between three and five million in Australia which is regarded as a very new market internationally and one which Coracall intends targeting aggressively following the opening of the Umhlanga call centre.
"In the UK, we are investing in our people and we intend to mirror that here," Lightfoot said. Managing director Ian Kinsey said that Coracall, which will spend the first two months focusing on bedding down its new systems, would start out with a team of 93 which was expected to grow to well over 300 within the next three months. Within just 18 months, he expects to have a staff of 1 700.
