We're getting a new Daddy

As you may have seen in the press over the last couple of days (on Channel EMEA, CRN or Bloomberg amongst others), a company called Platin 274 which is financed by Barclays Private Equity in the background, has made a friendly offer to acquire the COMPUTERLINKS group for €15.50 per share. This values our company at €104 million or approximately 82 million pounds.

I am extremely pleased by this news. With the current rate of consolidation in our industry (Arrow buying DNS, DNS buying Centia, Avnet buying part of Magirus, Avnet potentially buying Horizon and so on), it was only a matter of time before we were snapped up. Our growth has been exceptional over the last few years, especially in such a competitive market where product margins are being reduced at such a rate of knots, and this growth was in no way reflected in our stock market price. For a company that now has a major presence in 17 or 18 countries worldwide and consistently showed contra-market upward development, hovering around 11 or 12 Euros a share was simply not good enough. With a powerful financial partner behind us, I think we can move forward a lot more quickly and dynamically without the pressure of being a listed company and all the inevitable shackles and responsibilities to share-holders that that entails.

The most important thing for me however, is that we weren't acquired by a competitor. Niche players such as us who offer genuine value to the customers who buy from us, as opposed to just shifting boxes out the door, are becoming thin on the ground. I have developed a great affinity to COMPUTERLINKS, they have served me well and I like to think the reverse is also true. So I would definitely not appreciate having to work for another distributor, purely interested in accessing our customer base with no understanding of the company spirit. This has happened to some of our competitors recently and I'm really glad our board found a serious, cash-rich, long-term backer not already associated with the industry.

Finally, I also think Barclays have uncovered an absolute bargain. 82 million pounds, bearing in mind other recent technology acquisitions, is a steal in my opinion. 82 million would have got you almost exactly a third of XenSource, a company with a turnover, if the grapevine is to be believed, of 5 million dollars. Maybe that's not quite apples and apples but I wouldn't be surprised if Barclays look to sell COMPUTERLINKS in a few years time for an awful lot more than 104 million Euro. Let's hope staff get share options then...