Evergreen Services Group Enters New Zealand Market With Lancom Technology Acquisition

‘The interesting thing about that market is there have not been a lot of options for M&A activity down there,’ says Craig Fulton, adviser for brand, M&A and community at Evergreen. ‘You see MSPs buying other MSPs and you see private equity investing in MSPs, but the market needed another option. When we acquire, we hold forever—we retain the brand, the people, the systems, everything.’

Evergreen Services Group has acquired Auckland, New Zealand-based Lancom Technology to expand into the Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) MSP markets.

“We found that Evergreen’s model of a permanent home for our business and hold forever very appealing,” Waruna Kirimetiyawa, CEO of Lancom, told CRN. “We have spent 35 years building our brand, hiring and retaining talent and long-term relationships with our customers. We have seen so many other acquisitions completely squander this value and be tied up in massive integrations of businesses and ‘cost optimization’ projects. The Evergreen model is opposite of this and has empowered our executives and business to realize its potential with stable ownership and investment for growth.”

San Francisco-based Evergreen is a holding company with IT service companies in North America, U.K. and now ANZ. Founded in 1988, Lancom specializes in software development, cloud services, managed services and business process automation. As an advanced Amazon Web Services and Microsoft partner, Lancom leverages cutting-edge technologies to deliver solutions to customers.

About 65 employees are joining Evergreen in the acquisition. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

As a holding company, Evergreen saw great potential in further expanding outside the U.S., and ANZ “looked promising.”

“The interesting thing about that market is there have not been a lot of options for M&A activity down there,” Craig Fulton, adviser for brand, M&A and community at Evergreen, told CRN in an exclusive interview. “You see MSPs buying other MSPs and you see private equity investing in MSPs, but the market needed another option. When we acquire, we hold forever—we retain the brand, the people, the systems, everything. We’re going to be another great option for companies down there.”

For Lancom, the opportunity capitalizes on Evergreen’s global network and resources to add depth to its growing cloud and software solutions. It also allows the MSP to expand into diverse new markets, enhancing its competitive edge and creating possibilities for collaboration, innovation and sustained growth.

“Being a business born in New Zealand and expanding to Australia, we as Kiwis are accustomed to exporting our technology, talent and services to the world,” said Kirimetiyawa, who is staying on with the company. “This acquisition provides a huge platform and a stepping stone to realizing that strategy further. We are also able to call on services and expertise from the group to further benefit our customers, especially in the areas of cybersecurity services.”

Lancom is excited to provide further expertise in software development, application modernization and business process automation as the MSP had “a very clear set of goals” in 2024 to expand offerings, according to Kirimetiyawa.

Australia and New Zealand are getting a lot of investment from major vendors like Microsoft and Amazon, Fulton said. Evergreen sees the opportunity to invest in MSPs in the area, become a strategic partner and help push infrastructure forward.

“We work with them in a partnership and say, ‘Would this work? Would that work?’” he said. “Each area is different, and each business is different. You can’t just throw a playbook at them. We’ll come in and help them with sales and marketing tactics, organic growth, financial management and pricing strategy. It’s really about making them more efficient first and then helping them grow through new customer acquisition.”

Evergreen has acquired more than 70 companies to date and, when it completes an acquisition, it doesn’t force policies and practices on the new company. Going forward, Evergreen plans to have a larger presence in Australia and New Zealand and is setting up teams in that region.

“We're all excited to be going into a new part of the world,” Fulton said. “We're really looking forward to the growth that we have planned for Q1 down there so there'll be more to come.”