CCS Media walks acquisition path

Derbyshire-based VAR makes first purchase after announcing intent to drive growth through acquisition

VAR CCS Media has made its first acquisition since revealing to CRN in August that it wanted to drive growth through complementary acquisitions.

The Derbyshire-based VAR has acquired the ongoing business of Leatherhead-based first4media, a reseller of tape media to the broadcasting industry.

Terry Betts, CCS Media’s managing director, told CRN: "The acquisition gives us an opportunity into a new market. The businesses are very complimentary and for some time now we have wanted a foothold in this market place. First4media’s excellent warehousing and infrastructure, especially it’s online ordering and management system (CIC), gives us just the right platform to expand."

CCS Media boasts 10 offices up and down the country with some 150 employees, and is expecting to achieve £50m turnover this year.

"Up until now our growth has been organic and although I'm aiming for 10 per cent organic growth next year I'm keen to look at more acquisitions. We want complementary businesses; technical services is an area I'd like to expand in," added Bett.

VAR Chess Telecom has made 16 acquisitions in the last 31 months and is still looking for more potential targets. Richard Btesh, director of corporate finance at Chess, told CRN: "It sounds like CCS Media has reached an area of critical mass and in order to continue to grow at a good rate then acquisitions make perfect sense."

"It is important to dedicate enough resources to integrating acquired businesses into your own company; we have experienced a real learning curve on this and my advice to others is to make sure you get the integration spot on," added Btesh.