Management buy-out looms for struggling Zultys
MBO not very pleasant, but not the end of the road, vendor's founder claims
The EMEA arm of IP telephony vendor Zultys Technologies is currently being run single-handedly by one employee in the UK, while in the US the company’s founder is preparing for a management buy-out (MBO) as the firm’s assets go up for auction under Chapter 11.
CRN exclusively revealed last month that Zultys had filed for Chapter 11 in the US Bankruptcy Court in the Northern District of California (CRN Online, 18 September) and last week we revealed that the vendor is more than $45m in debt (CRN, 25 September).
An auction of the assets was due on 11 October, but CRN understands this has been put back until 23 October at the creditors’ request.
Iain Milnes, founder of Zultys, told CRN: “An MBO team, led by myself, has already filed a bid for the assets. If successful we would buy the company name and web site so we would continue to trade as Zultys. In the UK, people tend to view bankruptcy as the end of the road; it is a process – not a very pleasant one – but it is not the end of the road.
“We are still trading and manufacturing and customers are still buying and installing our products.”
Martin Bond, former EMEA general manager for Zultys, was laid off along with other UK-based staff during the summer, but he was reinstated last month as EMEA general manager and is now single-handedly running the UK business.
“Although we have still got the UK premises in Berkshire, we haven’t reinstated the phoneline,” said Bond. “The reason we’re keeping the building is because we hope that post Chapter 11 we will be in a position to rebuild the team.”
David Thompson, managing director of Zultys distributor Siracom, told CRN: “We hold stock and continue to buy from the US. We had very little to do with the people in Berkshire as we provide our own support to resellers.”
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