Spescom Limited

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Spescom is a South African information and communication technology company. It is headquartered in Johannesburg and provides products and solutions to connect to the networked economy and provide software solutions to manage information and knowledge.

The company has operations on three continents – North America, Europe and Africa – and is active in the following markets: voice recording and transaction management; document, configuration and records management; and telecommunications test solutions.

The telecommunications test solutions research and development is primarily done by Spescom Limited (UK); its customers include British Telecom.

[edit] History

Spescom was founded in September 1977 Tony Farah, with ZAR 4,000 capital. Spescom's initial focus was on test instrumentation and it brought the world's first digital oscilloscope to South Africa in the same year.

In 1983 Spescom International Incorporated was established in Irvine, California by Gary Smith, a senior founder member of Spescom. The company's primary objectives were to maintain technical links with the company's traditional suppliers as well as to provide international marketing for products developed by Spescom.

The company listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange on 4 June 1987. In September 1990 the company introduced the world's first keypad prepayment electricity meter, Cashpower 2000, which was licensed to meter manufacturers worldwide.

In October 1993, Spescom won its first major international tender for prepayment meters in Brazil. This was the company's first significant global contract. Its family of prepayment meters is now sold in over thirty-five countries worldwide.

On 6 March 1995 the company formed a joint venture with Siemens called Energy Measurements in order to provide a world centre of excellence in energy management and revenue collection systems, focusing on prepayment electricity metering.

In November 1997 Spescom was listed as number 18 in the Sunday Times Business Times Top 100 Company survey. The ranking was done according to the return on investment to shareholders over a five-year period. In 1998 Spescom moved to 8th position in the survey and was also recognised as one of the top 49 companies in South Africa to work for.