Westcoast buys Clarity Distribution

Westcoast bought Clarity Distribution for £62m last week, as revealed by CRN Online, and the distributor has not ruled out further acquisitions.

Clarity Distribution is the Irish volume arm of Horizon Technology Group. It counts Hewlett-Packard, Fujitsu, O2 and Toshiba among its major vendors. The acquisition, which is not related to Clarity Technology, Horizon’s UK subsidiary, will be used to launch Westcoast into the Irish market.

Speaking to CRN, Andy Dow, commercial director at Westcoast, said the Clarity Distribution name, management and all of its staff will be retained.

“When the Clarity opportunity came up we wanted to take it because there is a great fit between the two firms,” he said. “We will take our credit and marketing programmes over to the Irish market because these types of things don’t exist over there at the moment. We can also take our core vendors into a wider market.”

Dow added that the firm is still on the acquisition trail. “If the right opportunity arises, we will always look,” he said.

Rachel Power, analyst at Canalys, said: “There has been lots of activity surrounding distributors’ acquisition strategies over the past few months. Westcoast has looked at the Irish market for a while and this move will help it broaden its geographical spread. It enhances both firms’ vendor portfolios and service offerings.”

>> Further reading:

Westcoast aquires Clarity Ireland

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