Exclusive Networks acquires €300m-revenue European distie
French distributor breaks into 10 CEE countries through acquisition of Polish player
Exclusive Networks has acquired Polish distributor Veracomp, extending its business into 10 new central and eastern European countries.
The French distributor today announced its acquisition Krakow-based Veracomp. Founded in 1990, Veracomp has annual revenues of around €300m and employs more than 400 staff across 10 CEE countries: Poland, Romania, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary and Bulgaria. Veracomp claims that it has additional reach into a further 10 neighbouring countries in CEE.
The Polish distributor serves around 3,000 reseller customers in the CEE region, Exclusive claims. It also runs a dedicated training company based in Poland offering more than 1,000 vendor-authorised training courses.
Around 75 per cent of Veracomp's business stems from cybersecurity and cloud - core business areas for Exclusive. Veracomp also shares common vendor relationships in Fortinet, F5 Networks and Infoblox.
The acquisition opens up a new region for Exclusive and presents an opportunity for the distributor to further grow its scale, reach and offering across the CEE countries.
The deal is expected to close in Q4 this year, but is still subject to regulatory approval.
Exclusive Networks CEO Oliver Breittmayer claims that expanding into CEE has always been part of its growth strategy.
"The Exclusive Networks story began in Europe and since expanding globally across EMEA, APAC and North America it is now time to expand further into central and eastern Europe, which was always in our growth plans," said Olivier Breittmayer, CEO at Exclusive Networks.
"Acquiring an established distribution group is the best way to accelerate our presence into this new region and we see great opportunities for our strategic vendor and GSI partners as we invest in building on Veracomp's strong foundations.
"There is already a strong cultural fit and operational alignment between the two organisations, but our plan - as ever - is to support continuing success rather than impose new structures, and key Veracomp managers are fully supporting the transaction. Veracomp has amassed vast experience and an outstanding reputation over 30 years and we are committed to adding to this legacy by extending our advanced global cybersecurity infrastructure expertise and value-based services to benefit partners, customers and employees."
"This is a very positive step forward for Veracomp and everyone connected to the business," added Adam Rudowski, CEO at Veracomp.
"Teaming up with Exclusive Networks shows that our approach has been working and allows us to contribute our expertise to a truly global mission while continuing to target growth and create more value in the channel. There are great opportunities for existing and potential vendor and reseller partners to increase scale in the CEE region, and for our people to write a new chapter in a fantastic success story."
The news comes just days after Exclusive's acquisition of Hong Kong-based VAD JJNET.
Exclusive has been expanding its business internationally over recent years. It broke into the US market in 2017 through acquiring Finetec's US operations. It then bought another arm of Finetec's operations in Canada, and then landed in Israel just two weeks later after buying Tel Aviv player SecureWave.
Exclusive Networks isn't the only distributor to target the CEE countries in recent years. Swiss heavyweight ALSO has made CEE a strategic focus over the last few years - acquiring several leading players in the region including Poland-based ABC Data and PC Factory, Slovenian player DISS Group, Bulgarian firm Solyron and Croatia-based RECRO.
Tech Data also gained a stronger footprint in central and eastern Europe following its merger with Avnet Technology Solutions in 2016.