Computacenter booked a 6.8 percent improvement in revenues to £5.44 billion over the least year.
The outfit’s adjusted pre-tax profits climbed by 35.5 percent to £200.5 million, making it a solid year.
The UK performance was also something for the firm to celebrate, with revenues increasing by 11 per cent driven by a surge in demand in its Technology Sourcing operation, sparked by the pandemic. The firm also reported strong Services margins, partly benefiting from reduced external contractor costs.
Computacenter’s £61.75 million acquisition of Pivot has been approved by the Canadian outfit’s shareholders.
The deal was first announced in September and will see Computacenter double the size of its business in the US.
Computacenter confirmed that shareholder approval had been given and the Ontario Superior Court is now expected to approve the acquisition, leaving the deal to be completed on Monday 2 November.
Computacenter CEO Mike Norris (pictured) has told the cameras at the Canalys Forum 2020 virtual conference that subscription based hardware sales were a marketing lie.
“If I was a vendor, I would want a consumption model. I see absolute logic in why I would want to sell as-a-service and not sell capital goods. Vendors have to be careful because I don’t think customers want to buy that way if they can avoid it.”
Norris claimed some vendors were “fixated” on consumption models.
The government has now u-turned on its drive to get people back into the office, but they shouldn’t have expected people to bounce back to it anyway according to Pete Braithwaite, COO at Computacenter’s KIT Online.
Braithwaite said that the the future is no longer 9-5 office days, five days a week, even once the pandemic passes. The future comes in the form of hybrid working, which could make cities outside of London and Manchester have access to a larger pool of talent.
“When we’ve seen how well we can perform at home, the idea of going back into the office five days a week is a little unnecessary. Of course with some roles, including many in healthcare, working from home isn’t an option, some do not have the space or desire to work from home and others prefer the social and creativity aspect of working in the office, which is fine. But we can’t scare people to return to the office when they’re trying to protect themselves and their family’s health, and they can do their jobs perfectly well at home”, Braithwaite said.
Computacenter has swallowed the Canadian firm Pivot Technology Solutions and effectively doubled its size.
CEO Mike Norris said: “The acquisition of Pivot represents an opportunity to increase our scale, geographic footprint and capabilities in the US. Canada expands our total market opportunity and helps us meet the needs of international customers.
Computacenter will pay CAD $105.8 million for Pivot in a deal which has been recommended by the Canadian firm’s board, but still requires shareholder approval.
The US arm of Computacenter will be integrated into Pivot, the firm added, doubling US revenue and headcount. Pivot’s US sales were $1.2 billion in 2019.
Resellers have been winning parts of a £500 million framework that will provide “end-to-end” IT to the NHS including Computacenter, Softcat, Total and Dell.
The Digital Workplace Solutions framework is managed by NHS Shared Business Services (SBS) and replaces the predecessor “Link: IT Solutions”.
Total Computers sales director Kieran O’Connor said: “We’re already working with NHS Shared Business Services through ‘The Edge4Health’, so are thrilled to be a ‘Digital Workplace Solutions’ supplier and see it as further endorsement of our ability to provide the public sector with competitive pricing, technical excellence and great service.”
The framework will run for an initial two-year period, with an option to run for a further two years after. Since publication, NHS SBS has told CRNthat the framework is worth an estimated £500 million.
Computacenter has told the world+dog that it does not seem to have been badly hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
The outfit already told us that last month that it had seen a surge in demand for laptops at the start of the crisis and its first quarter showed a slight dip in revenues, but profits had remained in line with the previous year.
It has now added some more details of progress so far this year, with the firm able to pick up some fresh business during the pandemic.
Computacenter has furloughed one in ten workers including engineers, project managers and consultants.
Computacenter said it had been off its feet as businesses reacted to COVID-19 by asking staff to work from home, even before the UK government imposed a lockdown on 23 March.
“There has been a marked difference in need from customer to customer dependent on which sector their business is in. There has been a surge in demand from many of our customers to enable business continuity particularly around home working and network resilience.
Computercenter bosses have decided to go without their salaries to show solidarity with furloughed staff.
CEO Mike Norris, (pictured) and Tony Conophy, group finance director, have elected to reduce their base salary to zero from 1 April 2020 until 30 June 2020.
The firm described the reason for the move as “showing solidarity with staff that have been furloughed across the business”.
Computacenter is negotiating to buy BT France’s domestic services business, in an acquisition that is expected to take place in the latter half of 2020.
In a London Stock Exchange filing, the UK-headquartered reseller said the acquisition will enable Computacenter to strengthen its position in the French networking market.
Computacenter CEO Mike Norris said: “The current coronavirus pandemic shows the importance of secure and reliable networks to our customers and this deal would significantly strengthen our existing French business in this growth area.
While Computacenter CEO Mike Norris has just reported a stonkingly good financial year, he is a little worried about what he is seeing in his crystal ball.
The services giant saw overall revenue grow 16 percent year on year to £5.02 billion, with its Technology Sourcing unit contributing over £3.8 billion to that number.
Norris warned that last year has set a “high bar” for its current fiscal year and that it may not see the same level of growth due to the impact of coronavirus.
“It is too early to predict the outcome for the year as a whole and there is still much work to be done, particularly as we have not yet completed our first quarter. Our services pipeline is the strongest we have seen for some time in both professional and managed services. While we still believe customers will continue to invest in product, particularly in the areas of security, networking, and cloud, it may well be difficult to achieve the same growth rates we have seen in recent years.”
Computacenter is seeing the green shoots of recovery thanks to its US business.
The services giant stated that revenue and profitability “remain well ahead” of 2018’s figure on a like-for-like basis according to an unscheduled trading update for the 11 months to 30 November 2019.
It expects the full-year trading result for 2019 to be ahead of current market expectations which were assessed at being £136.2 million on 9 December.
The US business had “bounced back” in the second half of the year, with Computacenter praising its contribution to revenue growth.
Computacenter has seen its business bouncing back after a challenging first half.
The reseller saw strong trading across the whole group, with revenue and profitability well ahead of its 2018 Q3 year-to-date performance, without taking acquisitions into account.
Computacenter’s Technology Sourcing and product business continued to flourish in the UK, it added.
CDW, CGI, Computacenter, Softcat, SCC, Insight Direct, Trustmarque and XMA have made it onto the East Midlands Commercial Strategy Unit’s (EMCSU) ICT framework.
The ICT VAR framework was announced in July of this year and is valued at an estimated £5 billion. The contract will run for four years until August 2023.
While it is still doing well, Computacenter is reporting that it is getting harder to make cash in the EU.
The UK-based outfit saw revenue growth in the first quarter despite a large software deal in the same quarter last year creating a tough comparison.
But in an update to the London Stock Exchange, the channel giant said that both sales and profitability were ahead of first quarter 2018, even before taking the acquisitions of FusionStorm and Misco’s Netherlands business into account.
Computacenter booked a 6.8 percent improvement in revenues to £5.44 billion over the least year.
