Computacenter on a roll as profit mushrooms

Corporate VAR giant sees turnover decrease slightly, but profit skyrockets for the first half of 2009

By Sara Yirrell

More from this author

27 Aug 2009

Be the first to comment

  • Digg
  • Tweet
Mike Norris
Mike Norris: We are pleased with the progress to date

Computacenter’s cost-cutting exercises are paying dividends as the corporate giant saw pre-tax profit rocket by 62 per cent for its H1 2009 interim results.

The firm posted an adjusted profit before tax of £18.2m for the six months ending 30 June 2009, compared to £11.3m in the same period of 2008. Group turnover dropped by 2.2 per cent to £1.2bn for the period compared to £1.25bn the previous year.

However, Computacenter is in a strong cash position, revealing net cash before customer-specific financing of £47.3m compared to a net debt last year of £29.7m.

Further reading

Continuing in its positive vein, the VAR saw group annual services grow by eight per cent to £487.3m, contributing to 47.3 per cent of group-adjusted profit.

It also revealed that the UK cost-reduction and simplification programme was "substantially complete", helping it save more than £13m. It also achieved " substantial progress in Germany" with managed service growth, and Computacenter France also saw a strong service growth, to reduce its adjusted operating loss by 25.1 per cent.

Mike Norris, chief executive of Computacenter said in a statement: " Computacenter made strong progress in the first half of the year, reflecting success in sharpening our focus on cost reduction, growth in contractual services and exiting from businesses that use capital inefficiently.

"This was achieved in spite of the challenging economic backdrop, which has affected sales of products and integration projects. The continuing trend in our business mix towards contractual services improves the long-term visibility and predictability of our earnings and the pipeline for the future is encouraging.

"We are pleased with progress to date. While much remains to be done, we are confident that we are on track for the year as a whole. Looking further ahead, our increased services mix, allied with our strong and strengthening balance sheet, gives us encouragement for growth in the future."

display:none
Loading
We won't publish your address
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms & Conditions

Your comment will be moderated before publication.

Will Apple's attitude to the channel change in 2012?

58%

16%

26%

0%

CRN Partner Connect 2012

CRN Partner Connect logo

CRN's premier networking event is back on 17 May at the Ricoh Arena

Date: Thu 17 May 2012

CRN Fight Night 2012

One of the fights from CRN Fight Night 2010

Channel fighters preparing to square up once more on 24 May

Date: Thu 24 May 2012

Sign up for our range of FREE newsletters:

Submit your email address and we'll send a link to a personal newsletter control panel

fragment image

The mobile enterprise: Secure the data, not the device

The proliferation of endpoint devices within the enterprise has highlighted the shortcomings of one of the traditional approaches to data security

fragment image

Measuring the ROI of Google Apps

This Forrester report compares the costs and benefits of legacy email and productivity software with Google Apps


Dave the dealer blog

Dave the dealer

Clocking off

Dave discovers that rozzers are seemingly living in the technology dark ages

View from the channel

Views from the Channel

Departing CEO has done Dixons a service

Mark Needham, founder of distributor Widget, argues that John Browett leaves for Apple with Dixons in better shape than when he arrived

To send to more than one email address, simply separate each address with a comma.