Empired on acquisition trail

Empired has posted $48 million revenues for the 12 months to 30 June 2013, an eight percent increase year-on-year.

The Perth- and Melbourne-based IT company saw net profit after tax rise 68 percent to $2.1 million and EBITDA increase 56 percent to $4.4 million.

Empired managing director Russell Baskerville attributed the growth to a strong focus on managed services clients and its investments in cloud solutions.

Baskerville revealed to CRN that 300-staff Empired is now actively looking for Queensland government contracts.

"We'll probably do that through acquisition. We have a range of strategic opportunities that we're considering."

Empired, which was founded in 1999, currently does not have an office in Queensland.

Acquiring a company in Queensland will better position Empired to compete for state government ICT contracts, Baskerville said.

He also revealed Empired is in the process of signing a "game-changing" contract with "one of the largest companies in the world."

"It'll increase the size and nature of the deals that we bid on. It'll be a significant step up. We can clearly go head-to-head with the major tier one players."

Baskerville declined to share specifics on the upcoming deal.

He did, however, say Empired is in an ideal position to compete for $150 million in contracts in FY2014.