Ideal set to unload troublesome PTI

Sell-off PTI is no longer consistent with the distributor's plans.

Storage distributor Ideal Hardware is to sell off PTI, its troubled enclosure design and assembly business, only six months after it acquired the company.

According to Ideal MD James Wickes, it is expected that PTI will be sold at a loss of no more than #850,000, but no buyer has been named as yet.

Wickes admitted the subsidiary was up for sale because the continued ownership of PTI was no longer deemed consistent with Ideal's strategic objectives following a review of the business.

Leeds-based PTI has suffered its share of tribulations over the six months that it was part of the storage distributor. In October 1997, the company MD Tony Howard resigned. This led to the entire 40-strong workforce being suspended from 20 to 29 October, on full pay, pending a review of the business.

The evaluation finally led to the sacking of senior sales staff Simon Burton and Paul Routledge for gross misconduct. Logistics manager Fleur Cranage also left after accepting redundancy. As at the beginning of November - four months after the acquisition - Wickes admitted that PTI was still not contributing to Ideal's profits.

Meanwhile, Ideal has also sold its New Malden business premise for #4.8 million cash. The proceeds will be invested in the firm's Chessington site which will now house the entire workforce. 'We believe it makes sense to have everything on one site. The move will also bring about savings,' said Wickes. He declined to disclose the name of the buyer of the New Malden site, but sources close to the distributor said it was supermarket giant Sainbury's, which occupies the neighbouring plot of land.

Ideal Hardware rolled out a Web-based online ordering system to increase the efficiency of the way it does business and encourage its resellers to engage in e-commerce. Boris, the online system, interfaces with Profile Online and Ideal's in-house order accounting system (PC Dealer, 10 December).