Easynet Acquisition Puts Interoute Closer to Revenue-Doubling Goal

After landing two new investors back in March, the CEO of European cloud provider Interoute set a goal of doubling the company’s revenue over the next five years.

Today, just six months later, Interoute announced its acquisition of British telco Easynet, a move it expects to help accomplish just that in its division that sells telecom services to large companies and government departments, reported Business Cloud News.

The company said that by including Easynet in the bottom line equation, it would have generated revenues in excess of $784 million by the end of June. Interoute will reportedly pay $619 million for “one of the champions of broadband competition in Britain.”

No doubt when Aleph Capital Partners and Crestview Partners invested an undisclosed amount to Interoute for a 30 percent stake, it paved the way for acquistions of this nature that would fortify its position in Europe.

It’s safe to say that Interoute has clearly kicked into growth mode and not likely to be acquired in what has become a fragmented European market. It does raise the question whether the company will elect to go public sooner, however.

Last year, in an effort to build out its network, data center, and cloud platform, the European Infrastructure-as-a-Service provider launched close to 10 new zones, including its first two in the U.S.

According to Interoute, the acquisition means that enterprise, government and service provider customers of the two companies will be privvy to a fuller suite of products, services and skill sets. Interoute’s portfolio includes 12 data centers, 14 virtual data centers and 31 colocation centers along with connection to 195 additional third-party data centers across Europe. It owns and operates 24 connected city networks within Europe’s major business centers.

Easynet has established relationships with key vendors (Sports Direct, EDF, Bouygues, Anglian Water, Bridgestone, Levi Strauss and Campofrio Food Group), government bodies and industry standard accreditors and operates to a number of recognized industry standards. In an effort to meet in-country data needs, the company’s cloud platform is location-sensitive and meant to make compliance with European data-sovereignty laws easier.

Additionally, the company is one of a select number of managed service providers approved and appointed by the Government Procurement Service to assist the UK Government in its mission to create a network of networks.

“These are exciting times for our customers,” said Interoute CEO Gareth Williams, in a press release. “Interoute is creating a leading, independent European ICT provider. This is the next step in our acquisition strategy and moves us much closer to our goal of being the provider of choice to Europe’s digital economy.”

Meanwhile, Easynet CEO Mark Thompson reassured customers that the merge will result in better service to clients. “The combined companies can offer broader and deeper connectivity options, as well as an expanded portfolio of products and services,” said Thompson. “The acquisition will expand an already market-leading cloud hosting capability in Europe.”

Neither companies provided a closing date for the deal.