Outsourcery buyer GCI gears up for acquisition 'splurge'

MSP already has more acquisitions in the planning stages after Outsourcery buy in June

Cloud-based MSP GCI is gearing up for an acquisition "splurge" following its purchase of Outsourcery, which elevated it to being one of only 10 two-tier Microsoft-certified cloud partners in the UK.

GCI now has seven Gold and Silver accreditations, three of which came from Outsourcery, which it says puts it in the "top handful" of partners.

Two-tier partners can sell to Microsoft's partner base and end users, whereas one-tier partners can sell only to end users.

Phil Hambly, chief marketing officer at GCI, said: "We are one of only 10 two-tier partners in the UK, when you think there are hundreds of Microsoft partners out there. Outsourcery provided two of the Gold accreditations. Our acquisitions are designed to provide additional strengths to existing core capabilities."

GCI, which bagged a £10m investment from the Business Growth Fund in 2012, has been operating for over 16 years and now has nine offices around the UK, with around 300 members of staff.

GCI acquired Outsourcery in June in a prepack administration on 16 June 2016. Hambly said a new office has been purchased next to its Salford datacentre to integrate Outsourcery into the MSP. The Outsourcery team will be located there alongside other teams from GCI's existing operations.

Hambly said the MSP has other acquisitions already in the planning stage.

"Over the years we have been trading we have acquired about 16 businesses over 16 years," he said. "We have had a bit of a growth spurt of late. Prior to our next splurge of acquisitions, we have brought on a new C-suite with a new chief technology officer, new chief operating officer and new commercial officer. These are people who know what good looks like; who have been in the industry a long time. Get the right people on the bus first. Watch this space."