Specialism: VoIP hardware
Key vendors: Snom, Yealink, TP-Link, DrayTek, 2N, Fanvil, Sangoma, Gigaset, 3CX, Algo
Revenue: £13.6m (-0.4%)
Headcount: 26
Styling itself as the “business to business market leader in VoIP hardware distribution within the UK”, this Huddersfield-based outfit has been plying its trade since 1999.
Provu roughly maintained turnover in its year to 30 April 2023, despite complaining of supply chain issues, currency volatility and negative market conditions.
Having returned to growth in 2024, the Snom and Yealink partner is confident it can maintain its form going into next year, MD Justin Carl tells us (see below).
“We have seen a return on our growth trajectory”
Quickfire Q&A with MD Justin Carl
What is Provu’s sweet spot?
As the UK’s first VoIP specialist distributor, we played a pivotal role in the development of some of our manufacturers’ secure provisioning servers. This is something we have continued to enhance and develop within our own systems. We always look to add value to the products we sell. Whether that’s developing a secure provisioning server to enable a plug & play experience, remote device management, installation services or bespoke order fulfilment, we aim to simplify the delivery and ongoing management of our entire portfolio.
Which product, service or vendor has stood out for you in 2024?
We are seeing more resellers broaden their offerings to include more connectivity-based devices such as routers, switches and access points. Over the last 12 months, we’ve continued to develop our services around these products to enhance our offering and make this transition as simple as possible. We’re also starting to see more resellers specialise in AV equipment, driving demand and sales for video conferencing products.
If you could change one thing about your business at the stroke of a wand, what would it be?
We have a great business, with an amazing team so there’s nothing we’d change there. However, if we could do something about the volatility in the exchange rates, it would be a huge benefit in protecting our own and our reseller’s margins!
When will the UK distribution market return to growth?
Throughout 2024, we have seen a return on our growth trajectory, with a near 14% increase compared to the previous year. We feel confident that this will continue into 2025 and beyond.
Name one area of your business where you are expecting to add staff in 2025
Our systems are a key investment area for us – they help us to minimise manual tasks and improve our overall efficiencies, taking away the need for high levels of recruitment. We would expect to recruit in systems and sales to support our continued growth.
At its Channel Forums EMEA in October, Canalys characterised AWS Marketplace as one of the world’s largest distributors, owing to its growing third-party software business. On balance, do you agree?
Yes. AWS have shown the world how to distribute a range of essential and future proof services remotely and brilliantly. We all have a great deal to learn from their model, no matter what our size and scale. Customers are becoming increasingly sophisticated, and we have to move with them or risk getting left behind.
If you could be a fly on the wall for a day at another distributor, which would you choose?
I think a day at Tech Data or Dell would be fascinating, but a day would not be enough. We should all learn from the biggest and best.
From a pure competitive point of view a day at Nimans would be fun!
See who made the wider Oxygen 50 Must-Know IT Distributors 2024 here.
