Forsythe Acquires Telenisus For Security Expertise

While Forsythe, based here, gains the right to the Telenisus name, it plans to fold the Chicago-based company's services into its full line of services, said Eva Losacco, CEO and president of Forsythe. It will brand the services with the Telenisus name, however, she said.

Forsythe was already in the process of increasing its security services when the opportunity came to acquire Telenisus, Losacco said.

"Our customers have been asking us to do more in this area in the last couple of years," Losacco said. "At conferences we hold with the CIOs of our customers, security has been coming up more often as one of their needs. . . . It was a build versus buy decision. We were committed to providing more security solutions to customers, and had hired a few people. But it would have taken us another year."

Forsythe had been in discussions for the last four or five months with Telenisus, but the real breakthrough came in December when Telenisus sold its managed services business to VeriSign, Mountain View, Calif., for $5.8 million. "We were talking at the time, but we already had managed services, and so we didn't need that part," said Losacco.

In acquiring the security services portion of Telenisus, Forsythe gets great technology, a great skill set, and an active customer base, Losacco said. Among the 25 people that will join the Forsythe team are David Nolan, Telenisus' COO and former president of Comdisco's disaster recovery unit. He will act as general manager of Forsythe security solutions and vice president of consulting services. Gordon Reichard, former president, CEO and director of Telenisus, will consult with Forsythe on an on-going basis.

Financial details of the acquisition were not revealed.

Forsythe's next move will be to expand its disaster recovery and business continuity business. "We are already in that field," said Losacco. "But there is enough new technology out now we are looking to incorporate in our disaster recovery and business continuity solutions, such as software, cheap bandwidth, and storage management software."

Forsythe is a profitable solution provider, and a growing one, Losacco said. The company had revenue of around $700 million in 2001, up from $638 million in 2000, she said.

In July, Forsythe acquired Enterprise Computing, an Englewood, Colo.-based solution provider in order to plug a hole in the map of its nationwide services capability.

More acquisition on a selective basis are possible in the future, Losacco said.