The Crane Bank has increased it market share in Uganda and its shareholders cannot countenance selling a going concern, the bank’s Board Chairman Joseph Birinobwa, has said.
According to Mr Biribonwa, Crane Bank is the fastest growing indigenous bank, and has opened 46 branches and installed over 100 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) in the country over the past 21 years.
Mr Biribonwa, who was responding to media reports that the bank had been sold off, instead assured depositors that its operations continue unconstrained, with new strategies being mooted over the years to improve the financial base and service delivery.
‘Five years ago, the shareholders and the Board decided to diversify and at the time the proposal that became public prematurely was the Initial Public Offer (IPO) root. That was a thought process as the branches spread and the expansion took root’, a release signed by Biribonwa states in part.
According to Biribonwa, the other option pursued by the shareholders was to seek a strategic equity investor.
‘Two years ago, still with the drive to strengthen the Bank, the shareholders and the Board decided to get a strategic equity investor preferably with a regional and even better continental network. This strategy is in sync with the inevitable trend of mergers and acquisitions, not just as an important forum of growth for purposes of the East African integration but as a strategic move at a global level too’, Mr Biribonwa’s release adds.
Crane Bank is one of the several investments that belong to tycoon Sudhir Ruparelia, East Africa’s richest businessman.
Full release below.
