Viglen has established an investment arm to cash in on the dot.com boom.

The vendor, which last week revealed a steady performance in its half-year financial results, has taken a 26 per cent stake in low-cost, all-in-one internet access specialist Intelligent Network Technology (IntY) through its VigEcom investment arm.

Although Viglen is still looking for someone to head VigEcom, Bordan Tkachuk, chief executive at Viglen said the investment in IntY would open up cross-selling opportunities and allow the vendor to market IntY produces to its existing customer base, particularly in the education sector.

"We believe many organisation are missing out on the benefits the Internet has to offer because of the complexity of installation and on-going maintenance. By putting Viglen's resources behind IntY we are set to change this for good," he said.

For the six months to 31 December 1999, Viglen recorded sales of £47.7m, a slight increase on sales of £47m during the same period in 1998. Pre-tax profit remained static at £2.5m.

Alan Sugar, chairman of Viglen, said the vendor was no longer dependent on cash sales of PCs to remain profitable, and said network-related sales, buoyed by Viglen's server partnership with Computer Associates, accounted for 16 per cent of the total.

Education sales, Viglen's mainstay, were £24.9m, an increase of 30 per cent over 1998.

Sugar said growth in Viglen's schools division, following its efforts to promote the government's National Grid for Learning programme, had helped it to contribute to the business on an equal basis compared with its other units.