Fast-growing ANS ploughs on with managed service push

Mancunian VAR plots £8m datacentre splurge after posting first-half revenue of £20.3m

Cisco Gold partner ANS Group has attributed a 13 per cent first-half turnover spike to its recent investment in its managed services offering.

The infrastructure and cloud-based services specialist, which now has 150 staff and more than 600 customers, saw turnover rise to £20.3m for the six months to 30 September, up from £17.9m in the same period last year.

Net operating profit rose 18 per cent to £1.3m and cash holdings by 39 per cent to £4.6m, which it argued would help it lure in new customers hunting for suppliers with strong balance sheets.

Customer wins during the period included DeVere Group, Salford City Council and Howard Jackson.

The Manchester-based VAR also revealed it is planning an £8m, three-year investment in a rack datacentre facility, dubbed the Sharp Project, which will house its i3 cloud solution and hosted National Cloud infrastructure.

This is in addition to its two existing datacentres.

ANS founder Scott Fletcher (pictured) stressed that his firm, which also partners with VMware and NetApp, has a 96 per cent customer retention rate.

"These positive results have been achieved following significant investment in growing our team to over 150 people, including an increase in high-quality expertise, specifically for the ongoing development of our managed services solutions," he said.

"Our future strategy is based on securing long-term recurring revenue from our managed services and increasing uptake of our i3 and cloud-based solutions."