Ambitious Exclusive Networks hunts for new investor

Distributor looking to take on new funding to achieve €1bn revenue goal

Pan-European distributor Exclusive Networks is looking to take on new investment after packing on €300m (£223m) to its top line last year.

The Paris-headquartered outfit posted a top line of €627m last year, a rise of about €300m on the 2013 figure. This included organic sales growth of 36 per cent, with the remainder coming from acquisitions. The business retains its oft-stated target of breaching the €1bn turnover mark by 2017 and, to help fuel growth, is looking to secure a new backer to supply a round of funding and throw its weight behind the company for the next three to five years.

The goal for 2015 is to increase revenue to €737m, all of which will come organically. The only acquisitions Exclusive plans to make in the coming 12 months are leasing providers in the UK and Germany, deals for which are set to be closed in the next few weeks. These will follow the recent buyout of French outfit Fibail System, and the subsequent launch of the Exclusive Capital brand.

The M&A engine is set to be fired up again in earnest in 2016, as the distributor plans to acquire its way deeper into the Asia-Pacific market. Exclusive recently made Australian player WhiteGold Solutions its first non-EMEA acquisition, and chief executive Olivier Breittmayer (pictured) claimed he has already identified other targets in the Asia-Pacific area.

"Our growth strategy is to grow our core business by the rollout of our existing vendors where we do not currently have them," added Breittmayer. "The second thing is to expand geographically, mainly through [specialist big data distributor] Big Technology; we do most of our business in the UK, France, and Benelux, and we are launching in Germany and Italy, and we will extend across the rest of the Exclusive geographies. The third thing is to provide high-value services, and continue to develop our global services [proposition]."

Look out on Channelnomics Europe in the coming days for a full write-up of Exclusive's 2014 performance and its plans for the coming years