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Salberg, Ubuntu merge into new R100m empowered entity

22nd May 2014

By: Irma Venter

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

  

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Precast concrete specialists Salberg Concrete Products and Ubuntu Pre-Cast have merged to form a new company with an estimated yearly turnover of R100-million.

The 51% black-owned company will retain the name Salberg Concrete Products, as it is a well-known brand in the market, said the new entity’s chairperson, Barbara Parker, at the launch event in Centurion on Thursday.

Parker’s father, Dave Salberg, formed Salberg in 1972, using a new method to manufacture concrete manholes, for which he filed two patents. He also developed the Salberg machine, a tough and easy-to-use machine used to produce precast products.

Today Salberg supplies a number of precast concrete products to various markets.

Ubuntu is a six-year-old company formed by Russel Samuels, and originally funded by brother Darin Samuels.

Prior to forming Ubuntu, Russel, an engineer by training, was a director with the Murray & Roberts construction group.

Russel founded Ubuntu in 2008 with the realisation that there existed no empowered company in the precast concrete industry, and that the demand for box culverts exceeded demand.

He wanted to grow the business, and, in the end, realised that a merger with Salberg was the best way to reach this goal.

Parker, in turn, was aware of the fact, proved by research, that family-owned businesses faced a number of challenges in the third generation of management and ownership.

Russel is the CEO of the new merged entity.

Ubuntu’s factory near Krugersdorp will close its doors, and merge with Salberg’s plant, near Irene.

The new company employs around 200 people.

Russel said the aim is to develop a growth path for the new company that will see it become equal to, or bigger than the country’s major precast companies, and to gain market share through service delivery excellence.

The merger creates a more powerful, hungry competitor, he noted.

“Russel has that energy, that magic that entrepreneurs bring to the table,” Parker told Engineering News Online. “This is a marriage made in heaven. It is not mechanistic, but organic.”

She added that the new entity will focus on three product lines.

This first is the standard product line, such as sewage and stormwater pipes, with the second customised products.

There will also be renewed vigour in selling the Salberg machine in South Africa and other emerging economies.

“European machines bring with them a post dependency on parts, servicing and consulting. The Salberg machine is made for emerging markets. It is tough, and can be used by unskilled labour,” said Parker.

The Salberg machine can be flatpacked and shipped anywhere.

“We can supply the machine only, or we can produce a turnkey factory, or we can even run the factory,” explains Parker.

The erstwhile Salberg has been largely active in Gauteng to date, she added, as transporting heavy precast products is costly and challenging.

However, the new Salberg aims to set up a factory in Durban and Zambia within the next 18 months.

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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