Micro Warehouse up for auction
Potential buyers line up as online reseller's European assets to be sold off
Micro Warehouse's European business is to be auctioned off to the highest bidder in March, the firm's UK managing director has confirmed to CRN.
The channel rumour mill went into overdrive last week, as speculation mounted that more companies had expressed an interest in buying the online reseller.
Nigel Foxwell, managing director of Micro Warehouse Ltd, said: "We have had all sorts of companies registering an interest. The major players are still on the scene, including competitors and some big office [supply] firms."
Foxwell added that most of the firm's distributors have registered an interest, but mostly to see what was "going on".
"This is a difficult time and [the speculation] could be seen as a distraction," he said. "But we are trying to carry on with business as usual."
Micro Warehouse's parent company in the US went into Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings last year after its online assets were sold to rival CDW.
The sale of the remaining European assets is being handled by New York-based bank Miller Buckfire Lewis Ying (MBLY), which sent out 'offering memoranda' letters to all firms that had expressed an interest in buying Micro Warehouse Europe.
However, Foxwell said that even if an offer was made on Micro Warehouse and accepted through a court process under US Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, the firm still has to be sold at auction.
Even if a 'stalking horse', interested in the company, has made a successful offer, it still faces the prospect of another firm coming along at the auction and buying Micro Warehouse from under it with a higher bid, according to a senior executive at MBLY.
"But the stalking horse would get full compensation for any expenses incurred during due diligence," Foxwell said.
"Even if there are firms that have fallen out of the initial sale process, they can reappear at the auction and make a successful offer."
Nitin Joshi, partner at PKF, said: "There is substantial interest in Micro Warehouse because it has the know-how and customer base already in place.
"The company is ideally suited to another reseller that can incorporate its assets into its existing infrastructure."
Additional reporting by Karl Flinders.