Acquisition of Woodspeen Training Limited

Progility plc

("Progility" or "the Company" or "the Group")

Acquisition of Woodspeen Training Limited

Progility plc (AIM: PGY), the systems integrator and project management services firm, is pleased to announce that it has agreed to acquire Woodspeen Training Limited ("Woodspeen"), a subsidiary of Woodspeen Training Group PLC, which is listed on the ISDX.

Woodspeen provides training and skills development to unemployed learners and a range of apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programmes through a funding agreement with the Skills Funding Agency. It has been recently accredited as a grade 2 training provider by Ofsted. It currently operates in areas such as health & social care, business and administration, customer service, team leading, retail, IT, childcare, hairdressing & barbering and manufacturing.

Woodspeen has around 98 employees and operates from premises in Bournemouth, Bradford, Brighton, Halifax and Huddersfield.

Progility's Training division, ILX, currently provides training in the UK Cabinet Office's best management practice products, primarily PRINCE2, MSP and ITIL through a blend of on-line learning, games and simulations, traditional classroom training, practical workshops and coaching. ILX has been looking closely at creating a range of project management based vocational training products.

Wayne Bos, Executive Chairman of Progility, commented, "Woodspeen presents an exciting opportunity to extend our training capabilities into vocational and skills based learning. Woodspeen's recent grade 2 Oftsed report is a testament to the quality of its work. We look forward to working closely with the Woodspeen team and expanding the Group's training portfolio."

Group Description

Progility plc is the holding company of a systems integration and project management services firm specialising in people, processes, training and systems integration. The Group has four divisions: Technology Solutions, Training, Consulting and Recruitment.

Technology Solutions

The technology solutions division comprises Progility Technologies and Starkstrom. Progility Technologies operates a communication systems integration business that designs, implements and maintains solutions for medium and large enterprises with a focus on the rail, port, oil and gas, power, water and healthcare industries in Australia and on the mining industry globally.

The business, which was merged with the Group in October 2013, is headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, and has offices in Castlemaine, Perth, Sydney, Latrobe Valley, and Brisbane.

It has three operating divisions: Communications Australia, focuses on communications systems integration, designs voice and IP communications solutions for specific customers' operating environments and is a major provider of enterprise based Siemens unified communication systems in Australia; CA Bearcom, Australia's largest distributor of two-way radio communications products, primarily supplied by Motorola Australasia; and Minerals & Energy Technologies, which designs, implements and manages an array of integrated communications solutions for specific mining, oil and gas, rail and port applications.

Starkstrom is a UK based project management services' company specialising in manufacturing and supplying medical infrastructure equipment for operating theatres and intensive care units. Acquired in July 2014, Starkstrom is headquartered in North West London and with a manufacturing and assembly facility in Leicester.

Training

The training division comprises ILX Group, which provides a blend of on-line learning, games and simulations, traditional classroom training, practical workshops and coaching. ILX delivers training in the UK Cabinet Office's best management practice products, primarily in PRINCE2, MSP and ITIL. 

Consulting

The consulting division comprises Obrar in the UK and ILX Consulting in Australia. Obrar is a consulting and project management services company, focused on multimedia contact centres, corporate technology infrastructure and associated operational change, with extensive experience in delivering contact centre outsourcing on a global basis. ILX Consulting, located in Sydney, is an organisational improvement and project management services company, specialising in information technology, service and supply chain improvement and overall project and programme management.

Recruitment

The recruitment division comprises TFPL and Sue Hill Recruitment. TFPL is a recruitment, training and consulting business specialising in the knowledge, information and data management industries, which was acquired in July 2013. TFPL provides executive search, managed services and the placement of permanent, interim and contract personnel into the public and private sectors. Sue Hill Recruitment, which was founded in 1997, is a specialist employment agency to the UK information, market research, insight and analysis sectors and was acquired in November 2013.