Is this giant Nordic reseller coming to the UK?

CEO Steinar Sønsteby tells CRN sister publication CPI he is actively looking to acquire a channel partner in the next 12 months with at least 'a couple of hundred million euros' in revenues

Atea is planning to make a mammoth acquisition outside its existing Nordic and Baltic markets within the next 12 months, CEO Steinar Sønsteby has told CRN sister publication Channel Partner Insight.

The NOK 34.7bn (£3.16bn)-revenue reseller giant currently operates across seven locations in the Nordics and Baltics: Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

But Sønsteby (pictured) has told CPI that he is actively looking to acquire a channel partner with at least "a couple of hundred million euros" in turnover within the next 12 months.

"Twelve months from now, I'd be disappointed if we're not in at least one more country," he said.

Although Sønsteby was tight-lipped on potential target markets, the Nordics is regarded as having strong cultural similarities with the UK and the rest of northern Europe.

The Nordics already has one representative in CRN's Top 100 VARs in the form of Sweden-based storage integrator Proact, which acquired its way into the UK in 2011.

Another Nordic reseller, Sweden-based firm Dustin, has also been expanding internationally over the last 12 months. It broke into the Dutch market last July when it bought €67m-revenue firm Vincere Groep, which it followed up this year with two more acquisitions - another Dutch reseller called NoRisk IT, and Danish firm Norriq.

"We are actively searching for acquisitions. I cannot go into details, but we will actively search for opportunities outside the seven countries we are already in," Sønsteby said.

Sønsteby said there are "several reasons" to take Atea outside its existing seven markets, but he singled out that its vendor partners are encouraging the firm to expand into new countries where they are under-represented.

Atea's two largest partners by revenue are Microsoft and Cisco, but the Oslo-based reseller has strong ties with tier-one vendors including Dell EMC, VMware, Apple, HP, HPE, Lenovo, IBM and Citrix.

See Channel Partner Insight for the full story.