Ritter talks about Brink's after the sale of BAX

RICHMOND, Va.-- The Brink's Company vice president and chief financial officer Robert Ritter told Security Systems News this week that the balance-sheet bounce from the $1.12 billion November sale of BAX gives Brink's "the financial wherewithal to grow in different directions in security." The company will continue to expand and invest in its profitable Home Security Division, and will begin to focus on its commercial security offerings. Commercial is currently just a small slice--four percent in 2004--of Brink's security business. Ritter said there are no firm targets for the percentage of growth on the commercial side at this point. Initially at least, the commercial business will run out of existing home security branches, he said. "We'll use similar products to move into light commercial projects," Ritter said. "We're also in the process of bringing on onboard resources. By that I mean the right people [engineering and sales] who can help us with more sophisticated commercial business applications, such as CCTV, fire." To grow the commercial operations, Brink's may even acquire "a company or two" if the right company comes along. Asked if they were aggressively pursuing an acquisition, he said not "overly aggressively." "Michael Dan (president and chief executive officer of Brink's) has said on a number of occasions that he'd love to go out and acquire a company or two to help speed us along the road of growing our commercial side," Ritter said. The right company would need to have "good management that wants a platform to grow their business," he said. "That's not always easy to find," he said. "If we are able to find a match up with the right company or two that would be great. If it doesn't happen, that's okay and we'll just keep pushing along on our own," he said. Read more about Brink's future in the February issue of Security Systems News.