IT firm changes hands in £3.2m deal

A SUFFOLK IT communications firm has been sold to a London-based IT services group in a deal worth nearly £3.2million.

Q\Dos, based at Great Blakenham, was acquired by Hilton Head plc, a PLUS (formerly Ofex) traded business.

Hilton says its aim is to bring together some of the best regional companies in the UK to build a national-recognised and trusted brand servicing small and medium-sized firms and giving them better access to emerging technologies.

Q\Dos, which is one of the region's leading providers of voice and data solutions and has customers throughout East Anglia, as well as in London and the south east, said it wanted to become part of a larger group in order to exploit its knowledge and skills further and grow the business.

Its range of services includes surveying clients' needs to designing and installing a completely new system, with call management, routing, maintenance and service support.

Hilton, whose subsidiaries also include Bury St Edmunds-based Sicon, described the deal as “an ideal fit”.

Miles Berkeley, chairman of Hilton Head, said: “Q\Dos's consultancy-led approach and its proven underlying profitability make it an ideal fit with Hilton Head. We see Q\Dos working closely with our other East Anglian subsidiary, Sicon, to grow market share and expand throughout the region and the south east.”

Matthew Lidbetter, managing director of Q\Dos, said: “Q\Dos has grown into one of the largest providers of voice and data solutions in the region and we are now focused on developments taking place in the VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) arena.

“To exploit our knowledge and skills further, we decided that we should become part of a larger group.

“Joining Hilton Head will enable us to grow our business further, benefit from considerable cross-selling opportunities and profit from the potential economies of scale.”