CDW reports record Q3 as sales edge towards $5bn

CEO Leahy says the reseller continues to search for acquisition targets

CDW has reported a record Q3 as sales neared $5bn.

For the quarter ending 30 September the reseller giant saw revenue climb 12.2 per cent, while net income rose 9.8 per cent to just over $200m (£154.4m).

CDW reports numbers for its Canada and UK business together under the name "other". These two business saw combined sales of $507m, up 12.3 per cent.

CEO Christine Leahy said that the UK arm reported mid-single-digit growth in constant currency in the quarter.

"The team continued to help customers transform their infrastructures, gain efficiencies and improve interoperability of their systems," she said.

"As we have previously shared, our recently established presence in The Netherlands supports our broader growth opportunities in the EU and as needed serves as a Brexit contingency plan."

Leahy added that CDW is seeing some customers take longer than usual to make decisions on large datacentre deals, with Brexit and the US-China trade war creating an uncertain atmosphere.

"I think uncertainty, macro-uncertainty right now, is weighing on these types of decisions that are complex, where there are so many options, where customers are deciding things [like] on-prem, off-prem, private cloud, multi-cloud, consumption models, as-a-service, all underscored by opex and capex decisions," she said.

"It does feel like customers are weighing those options and scrutinising them with a little bit more carefulness right now. But the conversations continue to take place, and we're feeling good about them."

Leahy said that a large chunk of CDW's growth came on the client side, with businesses continuing to upgrade to Windows 10.

She also claimed that the reseller is actively targeting acquisitions, but was coy on how these may take shape.

"We are, as we've said, consistently, actively examining potential targets and those are folks who come to us; those are folks that we know in the market," she said. "But, again, we are a really disciplined buyer.

"Certainly, M&A is part of how we think about scaling capabilities, filling in areas where we think we could bolster those capabilities.

"But it comes down to what's available and whether or not it's affordable and whether or not there's a fit there."