Grubbs: Anixter Pleased With Pentacon

John Wolz

Anixter International Inc. CEO Robert Grubbs said not only are they pleased with the acquisition of the former Pentacon Inc. but also he has assigned additional responsibility to the fastener distributor.
The Anixter Pentacon operation had break-even results in its first full quarter as part of Anixter International.\
“We were pleased with the first full quarter results from Pentacon from both a financial and integration standpoint,” Grubbs reflected. “Like the rest of our North American business, their fourth quarter results were impacted by extended customer holiday shutdowns. When the soft sales of the fourth quarter were combined with $1.2 million of quarterly expenses for transition incentive payments and additional facility relocation costs, Pentacon had a break-even operation for the quarter.”
Grubbs noted that Anixter transferred responsibility for $130 million of existing wire & cable OEM supply business to Anixter/Pentacon management during the quarter. Grubbs described it as “a testament to the compatibility of the two operations. We believe that by consolidating the sales and marketing efforts for all OEM supply sales under a single management team we will be in a better position to capitalize on the sales growth opportunities of an expanded OEM supply product and service offering.”
Anixter fourth quarter sales edged down from $662.6 million in 2001 to $661.8 million for 2002, but net income jumped from $3.4 million to $10.2 million.
For the fiscal year ended January 3, 2003, Anixter sales of $2.52 billion produced a net income of $41.6 million. The sales were down 19.7% and net income was down 35.9%.
Grubbs noted that Europe and emerging markets set sales records in the fourth quarter. “Like the rest of our business, these geographic units do not have significant levels of backlog, so it is difficult to tell if these trends will carry over into the start of the new fiscal year,” Grubbs remarked.
Anixter distributes communication products and “C” class inventory components, electrical and electronic wire and cable to OEMs. Anixter carries 185,000 products and $500 million in inventory in the 4.4 million square feet of space in its 125 warehouses. �2003 FastenerNews.com