Leeds-based Explorer UK has been acquired by firm backed by YFM

Leeds-based IT company Explorer UK has been acquired by a counterpart backed by private equity firm YFM Equity Partners creating a £20 million group.

Explorer UK is an Oracle consultancy, development and support provider employing about 50 staff.

It has been acquired by DSP, which was founded in 1999 and has grown to a turnover of almost £10 million with approximately 40 staff.

DSP is an enterprise data and managed services specialist with offices in London, Nottingham and Basingstoke. The company is backed by Leeds headquartered YFM Equity Partners, which invested £5.3m in the business in 2018 to fund its £10m MBO, led by Simon Goodenough, making it the sixth investment from YFM’s Buyout Fund I.

Since the 2018 management buyout, DSP has doubled turnover and profitability, and grown its contract base by 300 per cent.

The deal for Explorer UK, which included working capital provided by Santander Growth Finance, is set to broaden DSP’s data infrastructure capabilities to provide a wider range of consultancy and managed service offerings. It is also expected to boost group revenues to more than £20m, increase profits substantively and provide a further platform for both organic and acquisitive growth.

Both companies will continue to operate in the UK database technology and cloud/managed services market under their own brand names.

Eamon Nolan, partner at YFM, said: “The acquisition gives the new group greater scale, more capacity for growth, the ability to compete for larger contracts and puts it in a strong position to take advantage of the huge opportunities available in the UK and globally.

“Since our investment two years ago, we have already seen impressive growth with profits doubling and its contract base trebling, and we expect to see further expansion, both through organic growth and acquisition.”

Simon Goodenough, chief executive at DSP, said: “This really is a case of one and one makes three. It’s great news for our team, customers, partners and investors that we have been able to bring together two of the UK’s most renowned database management specialists at such a pivotal time for our industry. Our shared market knowledge and similar cultures make this an ideal fit, and together we have the scale and momentum to continue our ambitious growth plans.

“Explorer’s pedigree as an award-winning provider of enterprise-grade Oracle solutions addresses our need to offer clients a variety of options, from ultra-fast on-premise database infrastructures to highly secure, integrated cloud environments, all managed by our global managed services delivery team.”

Ian Thomason, managing director of Explorer, added: “By combining two market-leading specialists in their respective domains, we will accelerate our individual growth ambitions, resulting in a sum greater than its parts.

“As well as our shared and deep heritage with Oracle technology, customers from both organisations will benefit from capabilities spanning Microsoft Azure Services, APEX Development, Machine Learning and, of course, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. I am hugely excited by the next step we are all taking together.”