In advance of its planned merger with
Scandinavian consultancy Information
Highway,
Sweden’s Connecta announced Tuesday
that it will acquire Albatros Network, a B2B consultancy based in
Denmark.
Connecta will pay 69 million SEK ($7.8 million) for Albatros
which has 60 employees and offices in Copenhagen and Arhus.
The move is the first stage in a major shake-up of the Internet
consultancy sector in Scandinavia, where the forthcoming
merger between Connecta and Information Highway will create
one of Europe’s largest Internet consulting firms.
Christer Jacobsson, Connecta’s president and chief executive officer,
said his company viewed its first foreign acquisition as a
springboard to the Continent.
“Together with Information Highway, we will now become the strongest
Internet company in the Oresund area, where we see an enormous growth
potential,” added Jacobsson.
With projects in Denmark, England and Germany as well its home base
in Sweden, Connecta has been growing rapidly. Now, with the acquisition
of Albatros Network, it will have nearly 600 employees in the Nordic
region.
After the merger with Information Highway, the combined company will
double again in size to around 1,200 employees, Information Highway
itself having acquired several companies in recent months including
Internet solutions provider ELK in Denmark.
Hans Henrik Hojberg, president of Albatros Network, said Albatros
had been approached by a large number of companies with a view to
acquisition, but most of them lacked Connecta’s understanding of
what big clients expect from an Internet consultancy.
“In Connecta/Information Highway we have found the perfect partner
and now, together with ELK in Copenhagen, we can build an extremely
strong company here in Denmark,” said Hojberg.
In a second announcement Tuesday, Connecta says it is creating
a joint venture company with
Skandia Investment. The
new company will explore various business concepts in the new
digital economy, using a venture fund of 40 million SEK ($4.57 million).