Midwich chairman Andrew Herbert told his outfit’s AGM that the group delivered a strong performance in 2019, achieving revenue and profit growth while successfully completing four acquisitions.
“We remain committed to our established strategy of delivering strong organic growth, supplemented by targeted acquisitions, as well as building our expertise in a broader range of markets and products.”
Acquisitions made last year included Prase in Italy and MobilePro in Switzerland back in January, and Norwegian distributor AV Partner in May. Already in 2020, Midwich has sealed a deal for US AV distributor Starin Marketing.
Herbert said that the coronavirus was having an impact on the business and that would remain the case for most of the second quarter.
“The coronavirus crisis has led to very challenging trading conditions over the past two months and we anticipate this will continue at least until lockdown conditions, particularly in Europe and North America, are significantly eased”, he said. “At this stage, it is unclear how quickly overall business will return to more normal levels.”
Herbert assured investors that the business was in a robust position and more than able to weather the storm.
At the end of March, the business gave an update that summarised its financial position, reminding investors that it had signed a new three-year £50 million revolving credit facility which had underutilised capacity of £37.8 million in January. This facility also includes a £30 million accordion option and could be extended by two more years.
Herbert added: “The actions we have taken across the group to preserve cash and liquidity and reduce cost, coupled with our strong balance sheet and extensive credit facilities, gives the board confidence that the group is well placed to deal with the continuing uncertainty, and that it will be in a strong position to respond once markets start to recover.”
