More jobs on agenda as LDD Group expands into wholesale telecoms

The company, which employs 25 people at its base in Horsforth, Leeds, recorded a turnover of £11.6m last year, representing a 22 per cent increase in the last two years. With the help of its new telecoms offering, the firm says it is predicting that turnover will have hit £30m in next three years. Last year, it achieved a 15 per cent gross profit margin.

Group sales director Mandi Iles said: “It’s impossible to ignore the convergence of the IT and telecoms market. We are ambitious and our financial growth in the last two years reflects that, so moving into wholesale telecoms was the logical next step for us.

“With our 19 years of IT and customer service experience, we are ideally positioned to leverage our existing product portfolio and our new telco offering to build a great value proposition.”

The new wholesale telecoms offering – LDD Telecoms – which will allow the company to provide a full LDD branded telecoms package for all sizes of business.

Mrs Iles said headcount at the company was likely to increase. “We took on three members of staff this year in sales and one in admin for the telecoms side and then what we look to do is add another person in the telecoms side before the end of our financial side which is December and then another one by the end of the first quarter of next year.”

The company may also launch an office in the south of England if the new division takes off, said Mrs Iles. The new telco division will offer “an end-to-end wholesale telecoms solution” including IP telephony, SIP trunks, non-
geographic numbers, ethernet connectivity and leased lines.

LDD counts Nike UK, Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and Symphony Group among its clients and has linked with strategic partners including Daisy Wholesale, O2 and BT Openreach.

LDD started life in the corner of a dairy warehouse in Seacroft, Leeds, in 1993. The owners of the business are directors Paul Hartley, Ian Hartley, Ian Sellars and Mrs Iles.