Poor Q3 scuppers Vanstar expansion

Top US reseller Vanstar has issued a warning to investors that its third quarter results will be less rosy than expected.

This could stymie plans for further European expansion. Vanstar already has a London office to service its multinational clients, in partnership with service company Integris and distributor Ingram Micro.

In the past year, channel observers speculated the company wanted to play an increasingly important role in the UK.

The giant channel player told Wall Street analysts that it expected to report turnover of about $550 million, with profits amounting to 17 cents a share, in contrast to previous analyst forecasts of 27 cents a share.

Jay Amato, chief operating officer at Vanstar, said that Intel was partly responsible for the predicted drop, according to reports.

Vanstar was able to source only 75 per cent of the Pentium Pros it required. Vanstar resells Compaq, Hewlett Packard and IBM machines.

Christmas was slower than expected and corporate customers were waiting for the dust to settle over issues such as the widespread adoption of Office 97 and Windows NT.