Daisy looks to bloom with £165m Alternative Networks bid

Daisy looks to bloom with £165m Alternative Networks bid

Daisy Group has made a move to acquire Alternative Networks in a deal worth £165.3 million.

The UK based telecoms company, which offers distribution and unified communications services, said Alternative represents a “strong and complimentary fit” with its existing operations.

Alternative Networks provides IT solutions to UK businesses, including managed services, data centres, and colocation and cloud services. In its last annual financial results, it posted revenue of £146.8 million.

Commenting on the Acquisition, James Murray, Chairman of Alternative Networks, said: "Alternative Networks has developed into a leading independent provider of end-to-end communication solutions and managed IT services to businesses in the UK.

“Today, Alternative Networks faces rising demand from customers to procure, manage and support the complete chain of enterprise IT and communication solutions. The combination with Daisy will ensure that the Company is best placed to capitalise on future growth opportunities and remain the provider of choice for our customers. In particular, the strong complementary and strategic fit between Daisy and Alternative Networks will ensure our competitiveness and benefit our customers through access to a broader range of unified communications solutions".

It is the latest acquisition for Daisy, which was founded by entrepreneur Matthew Riley, who took the company private from the stock market in 2014. Since then, it has Damovo and Phoenix IT in the managed services segment, and struck a £70 million deal with BT for cloud communications.

Daisy CEO Neil Muller said: "This announcement builds upon Daisy's successful acquisition strategy, to enable our customers to take advantage of digital technology in a converging world of business communications and IT.

“Alternative Networks is one of the largest independent providers of IT managed services and business-to-business communications in the UK and represents a strong and complementary strategic fit with the Daisy Group's existing business and operations. 

“Having respected Alternative Networks for many years, we look forward to further enhancing our capability and scale across our chosen markets and we believe the combined group will be well positioned to increase its market share further and to continue to be the provider of choice for its customers and partners."

Sources close to the deal said, if approved by shareholders, it is expected complete before the end of the year.


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