Industrial and commercial communications operator Metacom has opened its first European office in Belgium.
Metacom Europe will be providing highly specialised and integrated networking solutions to vertical industries in Europe and Africa.
“Metacom South Africa has reached a point of stability and maturity that allows us to expand our offerings to clients beyond the borders of Africa,” explains Metacom MD, RĂ©an van Niekerk. “Our goal is to provide European businesses with solid reliable cost effective communication solutions for their African expansion while also deploying our unique product range in the European market.
“We believe that with our highly innovative infrastructure, equipment and consistent research and development, we are set to succeed.”
Belgium was selected as the ideal location as it is centrally located with access to major countries and cities in the region.
Metacom currently has various areas of specialisation which have grown to maturity over the last 15 years. These include financial transaction processing, managed WiFi services, retail communication, Scada and engineering, M2M communication, retail video and retail radio, to name a few.
For the new office in Belgium, the initial focus will be on providing European businesses with cost effective quality managed WAN connectivity across Africa, while simultaneously introducing innovative products such as our Metacom Video and Metacom Radio content distribution platforms to the European market.
“We provide managed services infrastructure, significant expertise, and a full spectrum of managed WLAN products and solutions, engineered and designed by Metacom to support these market verticals,” adds van Niekerk. “Our tools are fine tuned to suit the requirements of specialised vertical markets and there is significant opportunity for us to expand these into Europe, Africa and Asia.”
Currently, Metacom has products operational in 22 countries around the world so establishing a physical presence in the European market allows the company to provide more focused customer service while continuing with its plans for expansion.
The company’s long term strategy has always been to build a strong foundation in Europe that delivers specialised applications on a broad-based communications infrastructure, that can adapt to local market demand and design.
Marius Visser, executive: business development (Europe and Africa) at Metacom, will be providing strategic direction and driving growth as head of Metacom Europe. His understanding of the market and the challenges it faces will ensure that clients receive the same quality of service and delivery as upheld by Metacom South Africa.
“This expansion into Europe also gives us a chance to provide those companies that need to deploy into the African environment with the tools they need,” Visser says. “We have significant expertise when it comes to Africa and can support clients by leveraging our infrastructure and providing them with the technology we have developed specifically to deal with the challenges of the African market.
“In addition to the support we can provide to our customers deploying into Africa, our unique cost effective technology will also allow us to bring new and innovative solutions to a number of market verticals in Europe.”