UK on song for Proact

Sweden-headquartered storage integrator enjoys stellar Q1

Proact's UK business is firing again as the pan-European storage integrated enjoyed a strong first quarter.

The Swedish-headquartered firm boosted its Q1 sales by 25 per cent to €78.9m year on year, although this growth level is reduced to 18 per cent when adjusted for the effect of currency fluctuations. Reported pre-tax profit rose 47 per cent to €2.74m.

The big jump in profit came despite a quarter in which product sales grew faster than services; the VAR's "system solutions" revenue grew 31 per cent annually to €54.46m. Meanwhile "services operations" saw turnover increase 15 per cent to €24.45m, although within this segment cloud revenue jumped by a meaty 53 per cent to €7.26m.

From a geographical perspective, Proact's homeland proved its major growth engine in Q1, with sales in the Nordics growing 40.4 per cent year on year to €47.1m – almost 60 per cent of the overall total.

After struggling for form in recent times, the UK operation also enjoyed a healthy revenue rise, with the top line spiking 21.4 per cent to €18.8m and EBITDA powering up from €30,000 to €650,000 year on year.

The rest of western Europe posted more modest growth, with turnover up 5.2 per cent to €10.8m, while the storage integrator's sales in eastern Europe declined by almost a fifth to about €3m. Revenue from its Proact Finance business dropped more than 30 per cent year on year to a little less than €2.5m.

In his report, chief executive Martin Ödman asserts that the company is on the right path.

"I am still of the opinion that pursuing our strategic choice of focusing on developing our offering in the field of storage, with associated consultancy and support services, as well as increasing our focus on integrated systems and private cloud services, is the right thing to do," he writes.

"Moreover, I can see that the in-house initiatives commenced last year in respect of fields such as innovation and sales have made us more competitive. Our ability to help our customers to minimise risks and reduce costs, and also to supply flexible IT services and products, places us in a strong position on the European market, thereby giving as good opportunities for continued positive development in terms of both earnings and profits."