About a year ago I met up with the then MD of Colt Managed Services, and got a glimpse of the telco’s plans for moving into the ‘cloud’. Well, there’s been much water flowing under that bridge since, including a reorganisation which saw ex-Computacenter UK MD, Simon Walsh, appointed as Executive Vice President of the newly formed Colt Enterprise Services business.
I met up with Walsh again earlier this month not long after he had come on board at Colt, as he is now wearing the cloud mantle for Colt’s enterprise business. Walsh was deeply involved in the development of Computacenter’s managed services and cloud propositions, and now he has the challenge to extend this experience to a broader geographical stage.
Colt reported its FY results today which showed an 11% rise in managed services revenues to €173m vs a 2% decline in Colt’s total business to €1.58b. Indeed, managed services was again the fastest growing part of Colt’s business, though not fast enough to mitigate the 9% decline in Colt’s voice revenues, which now sit at €610m.
Clearly all eyes will be on Walsh, as his ‘patch’ is where Colt’s growth prospects truly lie. On past observation, we think he will rise to the challenge.