Cable & Wireless Goes on Buying Spree

[London, ENGLAND] Cable &
Wireless Tuesday acquired five Internet-related businesses in
Europe in deals worth more than $100 million.

Cable & Wireless says the five companies will add $40 million to its annual revenues in Europe as well as bring in
30,000 more customers.

Spread across Europe, the five companies are French ISP Pictime; German
ISP Point of Presence; Spanish network integrator Eaisa Group; and
two Dutch companies: Impact Group, another network integrator with
a branch in Belgium, and Widexs, the largest independent hosting company
in the Netherlands.

Graham Wallace, chief executive, Cable & Wireless, said the new
investments were part of an aggressive expansion into the European
business-related Internet industry.

Mark Heraghty, president of Cable & Wireless Europe operations, added the
company can now offer businesses of all size IP solutions.

“The acquisitions announced today bring additional support, product
flexibility and skills to ensure we continue to provide our customers
with the highest quality business IP solutions throughout Europe,” said
Heraghty.

The companies acquired by Cable & Wireless this week are all
very small in comparison to their new owner. Pictime employs
50 people and has 1,000 business customers; while Widexs employs
just 15 people and hosts around 23,000 domain names in the Netherlands.

Taken together, the five companies will add a total of 250 skilled staff
to Cable & Wireless, although their annual revenue will not
greatly increase the company’s annual revenues of $14 billion.

To date, Cable & Wireless has invested $650 million in its European
acquisition program, aimed at bringing a whole range of IP related
services to European business customers.