IT services and solutions provider 365iT appoints Pieter Hooft as non-executive director

Posted by Chris on December 19th, 2009

IT services and solutions provider 365iT appoints Pieter Hooft as non-executive director

Appointment of Non-Executive Director

Basingstoke 21st December 2009: 365 iT plc, the IT services and solutions provider, is very pleased to announce the appointment of Pieter Hooft as a non-executive Director of the
Company.
Pieter Hooft is currently Managing Director of UK Investments for LMS Capital plc, the LSE listed international investment group. He has over 15 years’ investment experience in
management buyouts and development capital in the UK and across Europe.
Commenting on this appointment, Peter MacLean, 365 iT’s
chairman and chief executive, said: “I am delighted to
welcome Pieter to the Board. He has extensive experience of
helping companies achieve rapid and profitable growth and I
look forward to his contribution to the Board and to his
expertise and support for the continued development of the
Group.”
Pieter previously worked at Apax Partners and JPMorgan
Partners. Since joining LMS Capital in November 2006, Pieter has joined the boards of
Updata Infrastructure Holdings Ltd, Entuity Ltd, Kizoom Ltd, ITS Engineered Systems Inc and
First Index Inc.
Pieter is a Dutch national and is fluent in French and German. He was educated in The
Netherlands and at HEC Paris.

Notes to the Editor
365 iT plc was founded in 2005 and now employs over 85 people. Through its wholly owned
subsidiaries (365 iTechnology Ltd, 5i Ltd and 7 Global Group Ltd), the group provides an extensive
range of IT services and solutions that address the nine strategic functional areas in IT operations and
management: IT Managed Services, Unified Communications, Business Continuity, Data Backup, IT
Security, Virtualisation, Networks, Storage Solutions and Infrastructure solutions.
Enquiries:
Stephen Bean
Marketing-Alliance,
Tel: +44 (0) 7747 100000
www.365iTechnology.com

Nortons Corporate Finance & Consulting

Posted by Chris on December 10th, 2009

http://www.nortonsgroup.com/nortons/services/corporate/

Contact: Rory or Ian.

After the Deal – Earn Outs and Lock Ins

Posted by Chris on August 10th, 2009

It may be possible to sell a business and walk away from it the day after completion but it depends on a number of factors e.g. How involved you are in the business – and it is often not possible to do so without considerably devaluing the business and reducing the price.

As we discussed earlier it is very important to have worked out very early in the process who wants to leave and who wants to stay and the purchaser will have stated quite clearly by now who they want to remain and for how long and who they don’t. This will depend on, for example, who they have and don’t have. They may not need your Financial Director or Sales and Marketing Director for example.

More than likely the key stages after Exchange of Contracts and any initial payments will be Completion Accounts, production of the Annual Accounts, first quarter numbers and then first and subsequent earn-out targets. This is where you have agreed stage payments for the business, after the initial purchase price and completion account payments, related to the performance of the business over a number of years.

It is possible that earn-outs are avoided but it is a great comfort factor  ( and therefore of value ) to the purchaser to know that he has key management personnel around for a couple of years.

One of the advantages for the business is that it has a very clear and well thought through business plan for the next few years( It is well thought through because it should be achievable ). This is always very powerful and gives clear direction to the whole company.

Often, as far as the employees are concerned, very little has changed ( and this may be a surprise to them ! ) except for a couple of the Directors and the fact that they are part of a bigger company.

Of course there can be circumstances where the acquirer wants to make more changes to the business. There certainly have been instances where acquirers have made changes that result in disruption, change and loss of jobs and sometimes, sadly and stupidly they end up destroying the value of the company.

However the whole point of going through this process is that you find the right purchaser and the right purchaser would have enough knowledge and experience to integrate an acquired business in a way that maintains and enhances it’s value and does not demoralise or destroy in any way one of it’s key assets – it’s people !!

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This blog post is a part of a series of posts describing The Sales Process – you can access the other parts of the series from the links below:


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