Iomart opens up on Cristie acquisition

Managed cloud services provider disclosed its acquisition of Cristie cost £3.8m, in its half-year results

Cloud services provider iomart has revealed more details of its quiet acquisition of storage VAR Cristie, which took place in August with no public announcement.

In its half-yearly results, ending 30 September 2016, iomart divulged that it bought the entire share capital of the Stroud-based VAR for £3.8m.

Cristie had £3.1m in cash at the time of acquisition, which meant that the actual spend was £0.7m.

The chief executive's statement also said that for the period from the acquisition to the end of the half-year, Cristie had pre-tax profit of £31,000 on revenues of £388,000.

No public announcement was made when the acquisition closed because it was not of a large enough scale, an iomart representative confirmed to CRN at the time.

Within the results announcement the company referenced Cristie's "particularly active" presence in the UK public sector, especially in education and health, as an opportunity for the iomart Group to increase its presence in those sectors.

In the first half of its fiscal year 2017, iomart's pre-tax profit rose 23 per cent year on year to £10.6m, on revenues which were up 16 per cent to £42.1m over the same period.

The results announcement also hinted at other acquisitions on the way, stating: "The M&A market continues to provide opportunities and we remain committed to continuing to complement our organic growth through further acquisitions."

Angus MacSween, iomart CEO, said: "Trading in the first half of the year has been very good and we remain focused on building our recurring revenues in line with our business model. We are uncovering an increasing breadth of opportunities to constantly grow that recurring revenue and remain confident in our future prospects."