Data#3 undergoes "major" restructure

Data#3 has downsized from five areas of specialisation to three to cut costs and streamline customer service.

The move included some redundancies due to consolidating its administrative divisions.

Data#3 managing director John Grant told CRN that the restructure was motivated by the tough economic conditions.

"There's no doubt we're all impacted by the very tight financial position. In the five lines of business, we had a lot of unnecessary internal activity. The restructure streamlines our operations, but it also streamlines how we service customers."

Grant said the restructure focused on delivering complete cloud solutions. "It's a major restructure. The whole strategy behind the restructure is that we're lined up from an end-to-end point of view. The thinking spreads from product to cloud. It is much more efficient."

Part of the restructure was the consolidation of Data#3's internal services unit, which Grant claimed would save the company $4 million. The internal services unit includes operations such as finance, accounting, human resources and vendor management. "There have been some roles that have been cut from the business, primarily in the internal services unit."

Grant said the redundancies accounted for "significantly less than 5 percent" of the company's permanent work force. Data#3 now employs 641 permanent staff. 

Prior to restructuring, Data#3 specialised in five areas: software licensing, product solutions, integrated hardware, managed services and people solutions.

The company has since streamlined its operations to focus on three specialisations: software solutions, infrastructure solutions and managed solutions.

The change in Data#3's operations follows a drop in revenue of 5 percent to $771 million for the 2013 financial year. The revenue decline was attributed to increased market competition and customers having to "postpone or cancel capital expenditure decisions in software, hardware and projects".