US IT wholesaler Avnet Technology Solutions (NYSE: AVT) expects to maintain 7-9% annual growth in Latin America after completing the purchase of US IT products wholesaler Bell Microproducts (Nasdaq: BELM), Avnet’s chief financial officer, Ray Sadowski, told BNamericas.

“Bell’s [Latin America] sales for 2009 were roughly US$500mn,” he said. “Based upon what we’re hearing, our growth estimate would be 7-9%.”

Sadowski said Avnet will be looking to sell to distributors, manufacturers and value-added resellers, which he said are not “significantly serviced today.”

“The market is fairly fragmented,” he said. “As the market continues to grow, we’re expecting that there will be more opportunities for that business.”

Prior to the announcement, Avnet’s operations in Latin America were limited to a small commercial office in Brazil. Sadowski said the company will now look to leverage Bell’s positioning across the region, making special note of Chile and Brazil, followed by Mexico.

“This [acquisition] will be part of our technology solution business,” he said. “There will be some key suppliers for us; for example, in the disk drive space, you have Hitachi, Seagate and Western Digital. In computer platforms, you have Acer notebooks and then some Panasonic and Toshiba products. It’s a well-rounded business… this gives us a good foothold in Latin America.”

Bell Microproducts is a value-added distributor of a wide range of technology products, solutions and services including storage systems, servers, software, computer components and peripherals, as well as maintenance and professional services.

STAFF REDUCTIONS?

Canadian news source ITBusiness quoted Avnet’s CEO, Roy Vallee, as saying that his company will be considering workforce reductions after completing the Bell purchase.

Meanwhile, Sadowski provided scant details regarding possible changes to Bell’s Latin American workforce.

“It’s still very early, and we still need to do a lot of work to understand the business better,” he said. “Having said that, since we don’t have any meaningful presence in Latin America today, our expectation is that most of the [Bell] employees and management team would come over to work for Avnet.”

Earlier this week, Avnet announced it will pay US$7 per share, amounting to a transaction value of approximately US$594mn assuming Bell’s net debt position at US$342mn as of end-2009. The deal is expected to be finalized in 60-120 days.

Headquartered in Phoenix, Avnet has 12,000 employees and sales in more than 70 countries worldwide. The company’s global sales reached US$4.83bn during its fiscal second quarter, ended January 2.

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