Bureau Veritas In E-Commerce Push

Bureau Veritas officials said a group-wide move into e-commerce is expected to underpin a projected nine percent growth in revenues and 15 percent growth in profits for 2000. Speaking during the Posidonia trade fair, Bureau Veritas chairman Bernard Renard said although growth by acquisitions is an important part of BV's program, he also expects to grow by developing an e-commerce strategy. Over the past few years, he added, BV has invested heavily in information technology in order to prepare for such a move. "There are four main things we can do with the Internet. We can use it to make our business more efficient and to make us even more user friendly to clients. We can be a major information provider. We can use our IT knowledge to help companies build e-commerce solutions. And above all, we can use our leadership in control and verification to bring some order to the Internet jungle. The Internet may be unregulated, and that is a virtue. But service providers need certification and verification, and that is our business. Bureau Veritas is uniquely placed to be the world leader in Internet certification," said Renard. Bernard Anne, executive vice president and head of BV's marine division, said, "E-commerce is already part of our business, and will be more so in the future. We are first in e-class, and intend to stay that way."