Irish firm Arkphire reports record operating profit of €1m

Irish IT consulting and managed services firm Arkphire saw operating profit almost double last year as turnover rose by more than 60 per cent.

The company, whose vendor partners include EMC, Dell and Cisco, reported an operating profit of €1 million for the 12 months ending June 2016, compared to €530,974 a year earlier, according to accounts recently filed with the Companies Registration Office.

Turnover rose 62.8 per cent to €52.6 million from €32.3 million, while pretax profits increased to €846,040 versus €591,000 in 2015.

Arkphire has achieved an average 400 per cent growth in revenues since 2011, and last year, was listed among the Deloitte Technology Fast 50, a ranking of the 50 fastest growing technology companies in Ireland.

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In 2016, the group acquired networking solutions provider Bootstrap for an undisclosed sum and announced plans to create 35 new jobs. Due to the timing of the acquisition, earnings for the newly acquired business are not included in the latest accounts.

The company is forecasting to grow turnover to €70 million in the next financial year with profitability to double.

Arkphire currently employs more than 75 people and is headquartered in Dublin with an international office in London.

The firm dates back to 1981 when it was known as Memorex Telex. It has had a number of incarnations since then. Following a takeover in 1998 it rebranded itself as EDS Global Services, before becoming AO Systems + Services Ireland after it was acquired by the German-owned IT provider AO Group in 2006.

The firm returned to Irish ownership in 2009 following a management buyout and relaunched as Arkphire in 2011.

"I am very pleased to report a record year of performance and development at Arkphire. Both operating profit and turnover for the business are significantly up on last year. This excellent result was driven primarily by the expansion of Arkphire's customer base and the strong performance across each of its principal activities, covering managed services, IT consulting, product procurement and logistics," said chief financial officer Jimmy Dalton.