Prolinx strengthens ‘Infrastructure as a Service’ strategy with Five IT acquisition
IT systems integrator Prolinx has revealed the acquisition of Five IT, a specialist consultancy providing virtualisation services to the commercial sector.
The acquisition is the firm’s third in 12 months, as it looks to cement what it calls its ‘Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) strategy’, building upon its expertise around virtualisation, data management and infrastructure technologies.
Footprint
The acquisition of Liverpool-based Five IT will also strengthens Prolinx’s footprint in the commercial sector, bringing in virtualisation customers and expertise in areas such as retail, publishing and manufacturing.
“At a stroke, Five IT boosts the consultancy arm of our business and strengthens our ability to compete for large-scale IT infrastructure contracts in the commercial sector,” says Andy Weller, managing director at Prolinx.
“Rather than paying a premium price for a large acquisition, we have made carefully, thought-out smaller acquisitions to build our capability. This enables us to help customers on their journey to provision IT more intelligently and effectively and for us to address the growing market for cloud services. We see huge opportunities and it’s where the market is heading.”
Acquisition history
In July 2009, the company acquired software developer Mason Stone, adding bespoke software for the finance sector and a team of software developers. In March 2010, it bought Stratford-Upon-Avon-based DCS, a specialist in IT infrastructure deployment. DCS added a 40-50 strong field service organisation with considerable desktop roll-out and desktop server skills to complement Prolinx’s datacentre server operations. In addition, says the firm, the acquisition gave Prolinx a commissioning and logistics centre, the size of two football fields.
In June 2010, Prolinx purchased a secure datacentre facility, from which it will provide datahosting capabilities.
Last year, VMware (VMW) awarded Prolinx Best Revenue Partner, Northern Europe 2008 after posting a 300 percent increase in its VMware virtualisation sales in 2008.
