SCC eyes aggressive growth plans

Privately owned firm celebrates strong year end and aims for £50m EBITDA as boss hints at more acquisitions to come

SCC Group’s star continues to rise after securing a number of key contract wins to help EBITDA grow a whopping 93 per cent in its latest financial year.

The Birmingham-based firm, part of the privately owned Rigby Group, saw turnover grow 9.5 per cent for the financial year ended March 2014, to £1.7bn.

It has made no secret of its ambitions to acquire more services capability after selling its distribution arm in 2012 to Tech Data, with its most recent buy being the £30m-turnover managed print VAR M2 Digital.

It recently sold its Dutch arm to rival Systemax for an undisclosed sum, reducing its international coverage to just three other countries outside the UK – France, Romania and Spain.

In the UK, revenue for the year grew 13 per cent to £751m, with EBITDA increasing 27 per cent to £17.1m. Breaking the figure down, product sales grew 13 per cent, and services 12 per cent.

Its datacentre and cloud business grew by 69 per cent, fuelled by a number of wins including Gist, Aggregate Industries, BOC, IBM and Highways Agency, which combined delivered more than £50m in value, with recurring revenue set for the coming financial year.

Both its professional services and managed services business also secured a number of key wins and renewals, guaranteeing future revenues.

James Rigby, chief executive of SCC, said: “I am delighted by this year’s results. Following the sale of SDG in late 2012, these results show our renewed focus on SCC following detailed strategic review and put us firmly on the road to our interim financial goal of £50m EBITDA.

“The services wins secured represent our best achievements and we are grateful for customers entrusting in our vision and approach to the market. I am particularity pleased with our outstanding growth in cloud services. Looking to the next fiscal year and on the back of our best-ever year of services wins, SCC is positioned strongly to continue its evolution through ongoing organic investment and acquisitive growth.”

Its three other divisions also gave a strong performance, with France seeing revenue grow five per cent, and Romanian revenue growing 72 per cent.

Although Spain’s revenue declined five per cent, the firm said margins had increased and EBITDA improved to £500,000 as the division continues its transition to a services-led business.