AB Group thinks about acquisitions and will continue investing in e-commerce
Warsaw, 08.03.2021 (ISBnews) – The AB Group is interested in market acquisitions also in Poland’s neighbouring countries and will continue investments related to e-commerce and artificial intelligence, company representatives told ISBnews.
„The very good results we have been achieving with very good debt ratios already allow us to look around the market with confidence. However, we look for companies whose business is very similar to ours, at least in terms of operating philosophy, values and culture. This was the case with AT Computers on the Czech and Slovak markets, which became a market dominator within AB Group, and we are on the same wavelength with the managers of ATC. We are analysing various opportunities in the M&A market, not necessarily in geographic and product markets where we are already present,” CEO Andrzej Przybyło told ISBnews.
He added that the company is not yet conducting formal due diligence on a specific company as it is too early in the process to analyse individual projects and markets.
„On the other hand, we look at acquisitions a little more broadly, namely as opportunities to acquire specific brands for our portfolio while consolidating a part of a given market. Our commercial portfolio includes not only brands from the IT and consumer electronics sectors, but we also have Rekman, a toy distributor, in the group. It is a dynamic market and a dynamic company,” the CEO said.
The AB Group will also continue to invest in new technologies and recruit more specialists to its project teams.
„We will continue to support projects related to machine learning, business intelligence or RPA (Robotic Process Automation) while also recruiting, among others, programmers to our teams. In the same way, we will develop e-commerce and cloud-related projects. Sales of software in the cloud model have been growing rapidly but the real breakthrough and leap in scale is yet to come. We believe that investments in those segments are the foundation of our dynamic growth and margin growth based on further operational efficiency gains,” – board member and CFO Grzegorz Ochędzan told ISBnews.
He added that the company was not currently at the stage of large CAPEX investments, such as a possible expansion of logistics resources.
„During the December sales peak, we found that our warehouse did very well, keeping reserves. Scalability, design for the needs of e-commerce and maximum automation of logistics processes are of great value here,” Ochędzan added.
„Perfect logistics for a distributor is important, especially in the era of e-commerce,” emphasised CEO Przybyło.
When asked about Amazon’s entry into Poland, he said that it could be another business opportunity for AB Group and its customers.
„We have been working with Amazon since 2012. It is also another sales platform for resellers. As a distributor, we are an arm of the manufacturers and it ultimately depends on them how the accents are distributed among the various sales channels. For us, the most important thing is how the market develops overall because we cover all sales channels. We can see a number of factors supporting IT sales, ranging from a favourable macro-economy and accelerated digitisation of societies to additional national and EU funding for the purpose. The positive trends seem to be of a long-term nature” – concluded CEO Przybyło.
The AB Group is one of the largest entities involved in distribution activities in the IT sector, operating in the Central European region of Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia. AB S.A. has been listed on the main floor of the Warsaw Stock Exchange since 2006. In the 2019/2020 financial year (July 2019 – June 2020), it had PLN 10.2 billion in consolidated revenues.
author: Marek Knitter
