Insight EMEA ship shape again, says CEO
'EMEA business stronger today than in recent years', Ken Lamneck proclaims
Insight Enterprises' EMEA operations are stronger than they have been in years, the global reseller's CEO said on its latest earnings call.
At the height of a lean spell for Insight in Europe a couple of years back, five top executives were culled in response to mounting losses and tumbling sales.
But CEO Ken Lamneck heaped praise on Insight's EMEA operations during the NASDAQ-listed firm's fiscal Q4 and full-year earning call in response to its improved performance.
For 2015 as a whole, Insight EMEA posted earnings from operations of $16.6m on revenues of $1.4bn. Those figures represent a two and six per cent rise, respectively, in local currencies.
"Our EMEA business is stronger today than in recent years, our management team has matured, our sales execution has improved, and the strategy to transform to a solutions and services selling model were showing progress," Lamneck said.
Lamneck added that Insight can be "excited" as it looks back on 2015.
Its global sales rose one per cent in 2015 to $5.4bn, a six per cent hike allowing for currency fluctuations. Earnings from operations were flat in constant currencies at $126.5m.
Q4 proved to be a slightly soft quarter, he said, as global sales slipped four per cent (down one per cent in constant currencies) to $1.4bn and earnings from operations fell 13 per cent to $30.6m.
"Despite somewhat softer market conditions in the fourth quarter of 2015, we believe that the investments we made over the past two years, combined with our global scale and expertise in the areas of data center, software and services, will serve us well as we compete in the market in 2016," Lamneck said.
Drilling down into EMEA, for the year, revenues fell 11 per cent to $1.4bn in dollar terms but were up two per cent in local currencies. Earnings from operations fell six per cent in dollar terms to $16.6m but were up six per cent in local currencies.
For Q4, EMEA sales fell 13 per cent to $342m year on year in dollar terms, a four per cent in local currencies. But earnings from operations leapt 10 per cent to $4.3m.
Insight recently rejigged its EMEA sales commission structure to focus more on cloud, and Lamneck said services sales here grew by more than 20 per cent in 2015, in constant currencies.
Despite this, services contributed just three per cent to overall EMEA sales last year, with software and hardware generating 58 and 39 per cent of the total, respectively.
On the call, a transcript of which can be found here, Lamneck said: "We delivered improved financial performance in France and Germany, where we have struggled in recent years and continue to execute well on our strongest businesses in the UK, Italy, Nordics and Netherlands. Currency exchange rates dampened our reported results all year. We are pleased with the performance of our EMEA business overall, where 2015 non-GAAP earnings from operations grew high single-digits in constant currency terms."