West Corp.’s story can be told with big numbers that are getting bigger.
The first one is $1.22 billion, the Omaha company’s revenue last year. That marked the first time West crossed the $1 billion mark. This year, the company projects, revenue will be $1.5 billion, which would be a 22 percent increase over 2004.
The next number is $113.17 million. That figure is for profits in 2004, the first year in which profits reached $100 million. Profits are forecast to be $135 million in 2005. That would be a nearly 20 percent increase.
But among the most important numbers are the ones that show how diversification drove the revenue increases for a company that started 20 years ago as West Telemarketing.
West, which had launched a teleconferencing business on its own, bought a major conferencing company, InterCall, in May 2003. Later that same year, it bought another, ConferenceCall.
Partial-year returns from those operations and from debt collection, a business West entered with a 2002 acquisition, accounted for $195 million — about 20 percent — of total 2003 revenue. A year earlier they accounted for less than 2 percent.
Conferencing and collections are projected to more than double their share of revenue in 2005.
“This year we expect 42 percent of our revenue will come from businesses we weren’t even in a few years ago,” Chief Executive Tom Barker said at the company’s annual meeting last week.
For this complete story, please visit West Corp Enjoying Increased Revenues from Collection Unit.
