Control Instruments` prospects are even better after a reported settlement of the motor trade wage dispute.
The electronics group is focused on niche segments of the international original equipment manufacture motor industry and worldwide vehicle and fleet management markets.
Among other things, its subsidiaries manufacture the Siemens VDO FM onboard computer platform and provide a fleet management service using Internet and GPRS mobile telephone technology.
Although still to be ratified by the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa), industry insiders say a strike in the motor industry has been averted, with an agreement being reached between Numsa and the Automobile Manufacturers Employers` Organisation.
Control Instruments MD Richard Friedman said at the release of his group`s interim results yesterday that if the strike were to go ahead it would have a negative effect on domestic prospects for the second half of the financial year.
However, he said this would be tempered by the fact that "local car companies don`t want to upset their offshore parents", and would keep exports going. But a settlement between workers and the trade`s employer body would be good news for the company`s domestic market.
Good news
More good news for the group is that conditions in its local market are improving with statistics released yesterday showing that aggregate new vehicle sales last month increased by 15% compared with July last year, rising from 34 095 units to 39 206 units.
On the product front, the company is also set to benefit from the new Control Instruments Bureau Services, launched in the first half of the year, which has had a promising start.
"The bureau is looking very nice," Friedman says. "The beta version was run last year, and we launched it without a hard push. It`s on the numbers in terms of the subscriber base."
The service provides an outsourced fleet management service using the Internet and GPRS mobile telephone technology to monitor vehicles and fleets as well as manage their productivity.
"Lots of players can tell where a vehicle is," says Friedman. "We can also tell exactly what is happening to a vehicle and can send reports through SMS, e-mail and to the desktop. It`s a real-time system."
Customers can access a customised page on their browser and have a snapshot of their entire fleet in any way they want it, showing which vehicles are parked or being driven, for example, with driving statistics for every vehicle.
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