In Q4 2008 Atea generated revenue of MNOK 4709.0 representing a growth of 8.5%. Services revenue reached MNOK 905.4 and continued with exceptional growth of 36.0% and software increased by 10.4% compared with same period last year. Hardware business fell by 1.7%, but still gaining market share in a tough market.
Full year 2008 Atea reached revenue of NOK 14.8 billion and growth of 11.8% was fuelled by a strong growth within services and software business. EBITDA of MNOK 547.5 is up from MNOK 506.2 in 2007. Cash flow from operations was MNOK 491.0 which is same level as last year.
“I am very pleased to see continued revenue growth in a tough market and that we are taking market shares. Our performance in services is exceptionally strong and shows our strong and growing market position within IT infrastructure”, says Claus Hougesen, CEO in Atea.
The revenue growth in 2008 is positioning Atea as the absolute market leader in IT infrastructure with growing market shares in the Nordic and Baltic region. Growing business areas such as Unified Communication, virtualization, mobility, software asset management, client lifetime management and self service automation, have been strengthened during 2008 where Atea has acquired 7 companies with 689 employees with strong competencies within these areas.
By end of Q4 2008 the company changed company name to Atea in all markets from Ementor in Norway, Topnordic in Denmark and Sonex in the Baltic’s. Sweden and Finland was already named Atea.
Atea respects that the IT infrastructure market is under pressure due to the economic crisis but due to our market position we still believe that we in 2009 and the coming years will take markets shares within all business areas.
We believe in thinking long term also during the economic crisis and investing in new business areas as well as in Atea’s unique eSHOP business model. Atea will continue to be an active acquirer of companies to gain markets shares and to capture attractive skills and competencies to strengthen our organisations.
Atea has earlier set a 20:10:1 target and to be realistic in the current market environment we will change the target to 20:11:1, which means that we expect to reach our initial target of NOK 20 billion in revenue and NOK 1 billion in EBITDA one year later, in 2011.
As a result of the satisfactory performance of Atea in 2008 together with a solid cash flow of MNOK 491,0, the Board of Directors will propose to the General Assembly to pay out NOK 1 in dividends to shareholders equal to 6% of the current share price.
For further information, please contact:
Claus Hougesen, CEO Atea ASA, mobile + 45 25 43 51 62
Rune Falstad, CFO Atea ASA, mobile + 47 90 61 44 82
About Atea
Atea is the leading Nordic and Baltic supplier of IT infrastructure with more than 4500 employees. Atea is present in 70 cities in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. The Group deliver IT products from leading vendors and assist our customers with specialist competencies within IT infrastructure services. Atea has an annual revenue above NOK 14 billion and is listed on Oslo Stock Exchange.