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Euro reseller giant Computacenter gobbles US-based FusionStorm

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Computacenter has flipped on its head the old phrase about Americans being oversexed, overpaid and over here. Well the last bit of it anyway. The reseller has bought US dealer biz FusionStorm.

The transaction will see London Stock Exchange-listed Computacenter, one of Europe’s largest resellers, spend an initial $70m in cash on FusionStorm.

Headquartered in San Francisco, FusionStorm sells data centre kit and a bunch of related stuff including professional, cloud, integration, support and telecom services.It leads with products from HPE, Dell EMC and Cisco

Some 450 FusionStorm staff will join Computacenter, adding to the circa 650 people in existing already based in the reseller’s North America and Mexico business working on the help desk and in other support functions.

“This transaction broadens our capability to serve our international customers and should enhance our existing customer offer and reach into the US marketplace,” said Computacenter group CEO Mike Norris.

FusionStorm’s current CEO Dan Serpico is to pass control of the organisation to Computacenter’s US CEO Mike Keogh over the coming months, and is expected to leave the company by the close of Q2 2019.

In the year ended 31 December 2017, FusionStorm turned over $595.5m in sales, and reported a pre-tax profit of $3.9m, including $5.2m in interest costs to its parent. The lion share of its top line pertained to product sales with just five per cent generated by services.

As part of the agreement, Computacenter will also cough up to $20m in deferred cash, dependent on certain profit metrics being hit over the next 15 months. Computacenter will also inject $45m to refinance FusionStorm’s existing facilities. All of this will come from Computacenter’s cash reserves.

The latest buy comes weeks after Computacenter took control Misco's Dutch organ. ®

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