Ingram Micro adds another $172 million onto $2 billion year

Ingram Micro Australia pulled off a big 2017, raking in well north of $2 billion and returning to a substantial profit.

The distributor's financial results for the year ending 30 December 2017 were only recently made available via corporate regulator ASIC.

Revenue grew by an additional $172 million, reaching $2.175 billion for the year. It represents a noticeable change for the distributor, which saw its revenue dip by 1.4 percent in 2016, keeping above the $2 billion mark by just $3245.

Meanwhile, net profit also shot up to reach $55 million in 2017, another drastic difference compared to the $7.5 million profit in 2016 which was down by $1.8 million.

The distributor didn't outline the reasons for the revenue and profit growth in its financial year report.

Last year, chief country executive Felix Wong described 2016 as a "transformative year" for the local business, which saw Ingram bring together its business units – including core distribution, life cycle services, commerce and fulfilment and cloud – in an effort to align its solutions and service offerings.

Wong said the flow-on effect of this was seen in the growth of Ingram's services business, and that networking, security and consumer products further highlighted opportunities for growth in its cloud solutions.

The year also saw Ingram continue to add to its list of vendors. Some of the new names include Symantec, DocuSign, Polycom, DragonWave, SOTI, BlueJeans, Dahua, BOSE, IOT Group and a new software distribution agreement with IBM.

Since the end 2017, the biggest local news to come out of Ingram Micro was in June when the distie launched Ingram Technology as a Service, a new offering that allows resellers to bundle hardware, software and services on a single monthly bill.

On the global front, Ingram Micro's Chinese parent company shot down rumours in January that it wanted to sell the business. China's Tianjin Tianhai had only finalised the US$6 billion Ingram Micro acquisition in December 2016.

Ingram Micro remains ahead of its distribution competitors in Australia in terms of revenue alongside its biggest rival, which is yet to lodge its 2017 results with ASIC. In its most recent available financial report for 2016, Synnex raked in $2.04 billion.

Other competitors like Dicker Data finished 2017 with $1.3 billion in revenue, up an additional $120 million that year, while Arrow ECS pulled in $626 million in the same time period. Tech Data reported $410 million for the year ending 1 July 2017.  

Ingram Micro has been contacted for comment.