Insight suffers EMEA sales drop

Corporate resell giant Insight Enterprises has suffered a decline in EMEA revenues as it labelled its first quarter results “very disappointing”.

The mail order specialist expects total revenues for the three months to the end of March to slip 1 per cent to $1.1bn (£558m) and admits profits will pull up short of previous expectations.

Even allowing for the weakening dollar, EMEA revenues slid 3 per cent to $318m, which Insight said reflected a decline in UK hardware sales. It blamed this on challenging market conditions and “internal sales execution issues”, which it stressed were resolved by March.

However, Insight also singled out the region for praise because EMEA gross margins are on course to rise to 14 per cent, from 11.8 per cent last year. That is thanks to strong software category performance and a continued migration to fee-based software programs, the reseller said.

Rich Fennessy, chief executive at Insight, said: “We are very disappointed with our financial results for the first quarter, specifically the results in our North America operating segment.

"We continue to be pleased with our EMEA and APAC operating segments as they each generated double digit growth in gross profit during the quarter. As we look to the remainder of 2008, the focus will be on continuing the momentum internationally, while taking the necessary steps within North America to improve our short-term operational and financial performance.”