UK shines for Computacenter in Q3

XP migration and flurry of contract wins boosts business for UK's biggest reseller

A services surge and a barrage of businesses upgrading from Windows XP boosted Computacenter's UK performance in the third quarter, according to its Q3 Interim Management Statement.

In the statement from 30 June to date, Computacenter said in Q3 its UK business had strong revenue growth, up 13 per cent on the corresponding last quarter last year to £299m.

It said its services business was a standout success, jumping nine per cent annually in Q3.

"The UK business is clearly benefitting from a number of substantial services contract wins over the past few years, not just from the contract revenue itself but from the projects, services and product pull-through the business is delivering," the firm said in its report.

"The company is also benefitting from customers' needs to upgrade their operating systems due to support coming to an end for soon-to-be-obsolete versions. The resulting project work and new business take-on mean that the company's professional services utilisation is currently at record highs."

For the business as a whole, revenue for the third quarter jumped 11 per cent (eight per cent in consistent currency) to £730m, taking its sales figure for the year to date to £2.16bn – up four per cent annually (one per cent in constant currency).

Services shone for the business overall too – up nine per cent in Q3 – while its group product revenue shot up 12 per cent over the period too.

Its German arm's revenue jumped 17 per cent over the quarter to £321m, while its French business slumped nine per cent over the same period – an area to which the firm said it needed to pay further attention in the future.

"Substantial work is required in our French business as we build our portfolio of services closer to what we deliver to customers in the UK and Germany," the infrastructure and services giant said as part of its outlook statement.

"Looking to 2014 and beyond, we are encouraged by our pipeline both within our existing customer base as well as new business opportunities, although we would expect this to have a greater positive impact in 2015. As a consequence, we expect growth, while still positive, to be a little quieter next year in contractual services, with 2014 profitability augmented by margin improvement, particularly in Germany."

It added its outlook for 2013 remains in line with the board's expectations.