PC Connection Acquires Amherst

After two weeks of competitive bidding, PC Connection beat out ePlus for assets of Amherst Technologies, a solution provider headquartered in Manchester, N.H.

Amherst (No. 144 on the VARBusiness 500), which recorded more than $200 million in revenue for 2004, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July, but was recently moved into Chapter 7 liquidation by U.S. Bankruptcy Court. EPlus (VAR500 No. 122) announced on Oct. 13 that it signed a letter of intent to purchase the operating assets of Amherst for $2 million, and stated the acquisition was expected to close within two weeks. Less than two weeks later, however, ePlus issued a statement saying the transaction "was not consummated."

Instead, Merrimack, N.H.-based PC Connection (VAR500 No. 46) emerged victorious, paying $7.75 million for assets that included all of Amherst's customer relationships and related intangibles, intellectual property, and miscellaneous furniture, equipment and other fixtures. Most of the acquired assets will temporarily retain the name Amherst Technologies and operate as a division within PC Connection's MoreDirect subsidiary, while the rest of the assets will be dispersed throughout PC Connection.

"I think we won the deal because, as far as IBM [which was owed money] was concerned, we offered the highest bid," says PC Connection executive vice president Robert Wilkins. "We've talked with Amherst many times over the past five years, but we weren't able to work out a deal until now."

Wilkins says the acquisition of Amherst brings complementary business and employees to the solution provider; Amherst has large customers that rely more heavily on high-end technology solutions, such as Unix-based servers and enterprise storage. PC Connection plans to retain all of Amherst's engineering staff, as well as some other employees, which will add a number of high-level technical certifications from vendors such as Cisco Systems, Hewlett-Packard and IBM.