Mr. Cosmas Maduka, founder and president/CEO, Coscharis Group, heads one of the biggest, multi-billion-naira business empires in Nigeria. Coscharis is an indigenous conglomerate with diverse interest in manufacturing, ICT, petrochemicals, elevators, banking, real estate, auto care, auto components sales and services, Agric and Agro-allied businesses. The businesses are operated through numerous subsidiaries under the umbrella of Coscharis Group.
Mrs. Charity Maduka deputizes as the vice-president of the group, which they struggled along together to build. Theirs was a marriage at home as well as at the business place. The company’s name Coscharis is an amalgam of ‘Cos’ from Cosmas and ‘Charis’ from Charity. They are fruitful both at home and in the business.
The family is blessed with four children – three boys and a girl, all of who are directors in the various operations within the group. Coscharis Group is therefore powered by a six-member family dynasty made up of the couple and their four children with support from hired experts from outside the family.
Coscharis Motors started operations in 1977 as an importer and distributor of automobile spare parts, vehicle accessories and various automobile-related products. A window of opportunity opened for the couple in 1982 when Coscharis was one of 10 companies granted import licenses for automobiles. With the quantum leap in business that followed, the company expanded into a group operation, as subsidiaries came onboard.
In 1998, Coscharis secured the exclusive rights to market BMW brand of vehicles in Nigeria. Range Rover car brands later followed while the company diversified into the sales of American car brands such as Ford and MG in 2001. Coscharis has since become the home of top end luxury and high value vehicles in Nigeria.
A combination of business acumen and strategy is manifest in the location of the operations of the group in key sectors of the economy. The automobile business appears to be the dominant business line of the group but it is actually a late addition to the range of businesses of the group. The group comprises Coscharis Motors, which deals in automobile and spare parts sales, Coscharis Privileges, which produces bottled water and yoghurt and Coscharis Medicals, which deals on medical equipment.
Others are Coscharis Technology Ltd – a big name in the ICT sector representing various global brands in Nigeria, Coscharis Mobility, which specializes in leasing of cars as well as providing drivers to companies and Coscharis Agro-allied, which is into rice production.
It is a large business empire that is yet expanding. The vision of building a timeless institution that embodies relevance and value was shared, pursued and realized together by Cosmas and Charity. Their ambition is still running big – to continually gain new territories for the business empire.
Progressively, the big dreams of this power couple are translating into reality. In November 2015, the first units of locally assembledFord rangers [pickup truck] rolled out of the Coscharis Motors Assembly plant in Ikeja, Lagos. With that, Nigeria became the only location outside of South Africa where Ford assembles cars in Africa. Coscharis has deployed fully fitted equipment, technical support and training sufficient to assume full control of production within the shortest feasible time.
With the assembly plant, the family dream of moving ahead from selling vehicles to producing them in Nigeria has been realized. Coscharis Motors, the flagship company of the group, is a household name known for luxury and value brands of vehicles. The company has in place state of the art auto service facilities across the country, providing automotive spare parts with specialized personnel for the top of the class vehicles.
Cosmas and Charity also pursued a long dream in rice production, which has come true after 29 years. Coscharis Farms Ltd – the subsidiary operating in the agricultural sector, has added Coscharis Rice to the group product portfolio. The company developed 2500 hectares of farm land in Anambra State in 2016 and now produces cultured rice grains into 100 percent Sortexed long grain parboiled rice for mass market supply and consumption.
The rice dream has continued to get bigger with a planned expansion of rice output from an initial 3,000 metric tons in 2016 to 20,000 metric tons at the end of 2018 in the first phase. The second phase of the project involves an expanded cultivation of 10,000 hectares of land with a production capacity of 70,000 metric tons of rice.
The mission of the dreamers is to bridge the wide gap between local consumption and production of rice in Nigeria. “We expect to create one billion-dollar business in rice production and by the time the Agro-allied business is fully developed, we should be able to employ over 3,000 people in Anambra state. We are not yet there but we are growing and the future is very bright for us,” Cosmas said.
Coscharis Group’s operations in the healthcare sector are through its subsidiary – Medical & Foods Ltd and CG Biostadt, which have been in the business since 1997. The company provides medical consultancy, pharmaceutical and diagnostic solutions to hospitals and homes. It furnishes hospitals and other medical centres with modern equipment and consumables. It also provides maintenance services for medical and laboratory equipment as well as training of medical personnel in minimally invasive surgeries and the use of modern technology.
Another subsidiary – Coscharis Beverages Ltd produces and distributes table water and beverages. Coscharis Technologies caters for ICT niche markets in West Africa while Coscharis Mobility is a forward integration vessel for providing solution to consumer specific needs beyond the purchase and service of luxury or value brand vehicles. The services of the company include car rentals, leasing, logistics, haulage services, outsourcing of drivers and staff and fleet management.
Coscharis Group also has a large operation in Ghana through its subsidiary – Coscharis Ghana Ltd, which holds Abro franchise in Ghana and has firmly established the brand in the auto care industry in the country.
