Logicalis buy increases its Notability

Firm buys IBM reseller for £11.4m

Logicalis has wasted no time in embarking on its planned acquisition spree, buying IBM reseller Notability for £11.4m last week. No lay-offs or management changes have been planned.

Ian Cook, chief executive of Logicalis European Operations, said: "Notability adds to our overall strategy of becoming a full ICT end-to-end business. We will aim at the mid-market: organisations with between 250 and 1,000 staff, but we won't ignore the enterprise market totally."

CRN exclusively revealed last week that Logicalis plans acquisitions of three resellers in the IBM, security and voice markets. The firm also entered into an agreement last week to acquire US VAR Eisco Technology.

Surrey-based Notability, which has annual revenues of £30m, will be renamed Logicalis Computing Solutions. The firm is strong in financial services and has eServer, storage and e-business skills.

Later this month, Logicalis will combine its former Logicalis UK and Satelcom businesses to form Logicalis Network Solutions.

"Logicalis will differentiate itself not only by having a superior understanding of the increasingly complex end-to-end information flows in an organisation, but by using that knowledge to install and manage systems, particularly in the enterprise server arena," Cook said.

He refused to name the firm's next target, but revealed it would be "a voice company".

Keith Humphreys, managing consultant at analyst EuroLAN, said: "At first glance Notability appears to mirror what Logicalis is doing in the US. But Notability is really an SME-focused reseller that carries IBM and Cisco. It takes Logicalis into the fastest-growing opportunity in IT."

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