Bechtle no longer expects to grow in 2024, with customers’ “continued reluctance to invest” prompting it to downgrade its full-year expectations.
Europe’s second-largest reseller was sunny about its prospects as recently as April, when it upheld expectations that sales and profits will enjoy a “significant increase” this year.
But the mood has now shifted following a disappointing Q2.
“The background to this is a continuing reluctance to invest, notably in the SME sector, as well as the development of public-sector business, which remains muted. In particular, the traditionally important end of the quarter was surprisingly weak,” Bechtle stated.
Q2 business volumes totalled around €1.83bn, an increase of around 1%, Bechtle said, while Q2 EBIT came in “significantly below” its forecast at about €83m.
The Neckarsulm-listed outfit, which ranked 41st in the recent Oxygen 250, now expects business volumes, revenues and EBIT to all come in flat this year.
That’s a far cry from three months ago, when CEO Dr Thomas Olemotz said “we want to and can pick up speed over the course of the year” after recording 3.4% business volume growth in Q1.
Having bagged a new €300m acquisition warchest in December, Bechtle has remained on the M&A trail in 2024, grabbing Spanish Apple reseller iDoo Tech in February and Italian IT solutions provider Magnetic Media Network in July.
Market bellwethers including TD Synnex have returned to growth in their most recent quarters as the PC market finally emerges from the doldrums.
But Bechtle is not the first mega VAR to complain of frosty market conditions in recent weeks, with SCC Co-CEO Steve Rigby recently acknowledging the Birmingham-based outfit’s recently ended fiscal 2024 was a “more difficult year”.
Softcat and Computacenter (the only European-HQd VAR larger than Bechtle) have also recorded a deceleration in top-line growth in their most recent numbers.
