When Jair Ribeiro da Silva Neto began his career as a lawyer in the area of mergers and acquisitions, he never imagined that almost three decades later, he would continue in this type of operations, not as legal advisor, but as the main character. This change in roles hit its final milestone in March 2007. Then, Ribeiro participated in the merger of the technology firm he created in 2006, Braxis, and CPM, belonging to Deutsche Bank and Bradesco. The result of the merger is CPM Braxis, a company that will invoice more than US$500 million in 2007 and which will become one of the largest in Brazil’s technology services sector.
The big news for Ribeiro is that the wind will be at his back. The world software and technology services market grows by 40% annually and in 2007, totaled US$50 billion. Even better, this growth promises to trickle down into new markets. Large US and European companies are trying to minimize the risks posed by the fact that today, close to 90% of the software and technology services exports in the world come from India. And when looking for alternatives, Brazil is one of the options. The South American giant enjoys coveted assets, such as 900,000 IT professionals, and being located in a more favorable time zone than other options, such as China and Russia, for tending to European and U.S. customers. “After a poor showing when they tried to go head to head with global players, Latin American companies have created a second generation, a niche strategy that takes into account the specific characteristics of the region,” reads a report from consulting firm Gartner, about the IT services market.
CPM Braxis' sales were approximately US$600mn in 2007Ribeiro, who was co-founder and president of the Banco Patrimonio (a joint venture with U.S. Salomon Brothers) and leader in JP Morgan’s variable annuities, he knows the characteristics of Latin America inside and out, and is betting strongly on the advantages of Brazil and of his company. “CPM Braxis has three clear competitive advantages: scale, with more than 5,000 employees, we are the largest IT services company in Brazil; expertise in ERP and IT for the financial sector--two areas in which Brazil has notable knowledge in technology, especially compared to India and China--and the focus on the offshore sector, with broad investments in English training and better practices in terms of methodology and process,” says Jair Ribeiro.
Another of Ribeiro’s gambles is to polish the one stop shop, a concept in which the customer can concentrate its IT needs with one company, with the resulting reduction in costs and greater productivity. With these competitive advantages in hand, Ribeiro’s challenge is to take CPM Braxis’s sales next year to R$1.4 billion, 30% more than in 2007. To achieve this, the objective is to increase the proportion of overseas contracts, which now represent 10% of sales, to 30% in three years. The company already has operations in Latin America, Europe and the United States, and has 14 software development centers and more than 200 clients, among whom are ABN Amro Real and Citibank, Brasil Telecom and Telefonica, Ambev and Petrobras.
Ribeiro went from a box seat to center stage, from expert in mergers to main character in one. He is now aspiring to carry out another metamorphosis, which will end up transforming CPM Braxis into a heavy weight player in the growing world technology services market.
