After recently announcing that it had reached the R1-billion-a-year turnover mark, South Africa’s largest black-owned engineering consulting firm GIBB has enlarged its corporate stable by acquiring 70% of architectural firm Stauch Vorster Architects (SVA).
In partnership with SVA, GIBB would now be able to offer clients a full range of architectural services, including master planning, urban design and building design.
“As GIBB and SVA International, we have taken the first step to building a firm to compete with the best in the world, showing that Africans can do it for themselves, by themselves,” GIBB CEO Richard Vries said at the announcement of the merger last week.
Established in South Africa in 1943, SVA has offices in South Africa, Mozambique and Mauritius, and is engaged in projects throughout the African continent.
Black Business Council (BBC) general-secretary Sandile Zungu added at the event that the merger of the two firms “could not be timed better”, noting that the opportunities offered to the new partners by the 18 Strategic Integrated Projects were “endless”.
“This is the beginning of a long summer for GIBB and SVA International,” he remarked.
The BBC head cautioned, however, that price fixing in the construction industry by some of the larger privately owned firms continued to threaten economic growth.
“There needs to be a greater level of ethics shown in the construction industry, especially with the recent revelations concerning price fixing among other firms.
“As a leading black-owned firm, GIBB has a moral obligation to compete fairly but fiercely. Our government needs to see that it is possible to retain sound ethics while carrying out its infrastructure plan and we, as the private sector, need to play our part,” Zungu added.
The group also used the opportunity to announce the appointment of former Business Unity South Africa president Nomaxabiso Majokweni to the GIBB Holdings board.