Leading Solutions acquires BCA IT

Stan Beer
Monday, 27 November 2006 17:37

IT Industry - Strategy

BCA IT, one of Australia’s largest privately-held IT infrastructure service solutions providers, has been acquired by IT services provider and hardware reseller Leading Solutions for an undisclosed amount.

BCA IT, with its origins as a retail store in 1983 trading as ComputerLand Melbourne, was appointed one of IBM's first authorised dealers in Australia. This business quickly grew and changed focus to the corporate market a couple of years later. It underwent a name change in 1988 to Business Computers of Australia and steady growth saw it expand to have offices in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Perth.

Following the acquisition, effective 27 November 2006, Leading Solutions expects to have an annual turnover in excess of $180 million and 220 staff. It is now the largest privately owned IT infrastructure service solutions provider in Australia according to the company.

Frank Colli, managing director of Leading Solutions, said the purpose of the acquisition was to take the company to the next level.

"We were positioned where a lot of large IT industry players sit — in that middle ground. Adding BCA IT to our company virtually doubles our size, which gives us the economies of scale, allowing us to become one of the dominant players," said Mr Colli.

"And there's almost no duplication in our offering because BCA IT's strengths — in medium to large corporates, TAFE's and federal government — are complementary to ours. Leading is strong in universities and private schools, state and local government, and small to medium enterprises. Given also that our software offering is geared around SMEs and mid market corporates, this ties in really well with BCA IT’s client base."

Leading Solutions is one of Hewlett-Packard's largest resellers in Australia and in recent years added Acer and Toshiba to its hardware offering. In 2003, it acquired Scala Business Systems (an Epicor partner) allowing it to provide the full range of iScala ERP products and services. Other software services include custom development and seven vertical market software products, obtained through its acquisition of Micro Knox in 2004. More recently, Leading has added Microsoft Dynamics to its ERP and CRM business unit.

Additional strengths that have been added through the acquisition include BCA IT's business partnership with IBM, Cisco and VMWare, its "Wintel" high-end professional services, and its "break-fix" national service and repair network of 100 locations around Australia where engineers provide repairs to IBM, HP, Toshiba, Lexmark and DELL equipment.

"The new Leading Solutions entity creates a very good and even market, much more than any of our competitors, and gives us huge volume increases and marketshare," said Mr Colli. "This allows us to have considerable depth and breadth in our product and service offering, from handhelds and laptops to PCs, servers and printers. Plus, we have the technical skills to back this up as well as being able to handle large rollouts across Australia. All this makes us more effective for our customers."

BCA IT's two equal shareholders and directors, Stephen Harrington and Andrew Carter, will work with Leading Solutions on a consultancy basis to help complete the transition, which will extend into 2007.