Richmond Hill, Ont.-based Duologik Solutions has acquired the audio-visual integration business of Duocom Canada Inc. after the two companies have successfully won several large contracts together, according to Zoreena Abas, Duologik’s general manager.
“The goal was to try to merge AV and IT,” she said. “AV and IT more and more are handled by the same people.” Duologik offers a variety of IT solutions such as security and virtualization, along with integration services.
The acquisition represents about 85 per cent of the company’s overall business in Montreal, Halifax, Ottawa, Toronto, Kitchener, Ont. Duologik has acquired about 52 staff, along with Duocom’s customer base, comprised mainly of what Abas calls large Fortune 500-type companies.
“We’re going to merge the IT and AV and go to market as a unified IT-AV technology company,” she said. “I’m confident it’s going to work because we’ve won quite a few contracts together.”
The two companies completed a contract with the city of Vaughan’s new city hall for example, which opens officially on Sept. 25, implementing the networked AV-including digital sound, projection equipment and video streaming- for several of the boardrooms. “It’s a prime example of how the IT department took over AV projects,” she said
.“We had teamed with Duocom for the last two years going to market with them for AV and IT,” she said, “Then we noticed that traction they were getting. Together, we were able to win some fairly big contracts.”
While IT and AV have seemed to be at odds, the oil and water dynamic is changing, according to some analysts. “I think it makes a lot of sense for companies to converge like this,” said James McCloskey, a senior analyst with London, Ont.-based Info-Tech Research. “IT service providers who can add an AV component to their offering can offer more to the customer.”
“The reality is that with the other competitors, that challenge is there for the AV vendors anyway,” McCloskey said. When partnering with IT service providers, margins could potentially go down, but it’s a new way to sell to business customers, he said.
The business model for AV is also changing to one that’s more service-oriented, similar to IT, added Mark Mayfield, an independent consultant based in the Boston area who has worked in the AV industry for more than 25 years.
The issue of “convergence,” or IT and AV coming together, has been a hot topic since the late 1990s when the first projectors with Ethernet ports came out, Mayfield said. “There was a lot of territorialism going on at the time,” which lasted into the 2000s, he said. There was, however, an understanding that AV professionals needed to understand networking.
“That is happening in both directions,” he said. “Some AV companies are actually acquiring IT capabilities.” It is now moving toward having professionals becoming versed in both technologies, but mainly, the expertise is divided. “The understanding and the respect of the fact that they are two different technologies…is really the key,” to making mergers like this successful.
Harmeet Singh is a staff writer with Computer Dealer News. Follow her on Twitter @HarmeetCDN.
