Apple's Australia's top dealer goes pear-shaped

Channel Flannel

Apple Australia has lost patience with Buzzle, its biggest reseller, and placed the company into receivership, according to Computer Daily News.
Buzzle collapsed owing AUS$30m, almost half of which was owed to Apple. The company, formed last year through the amalgamation of six dealerships, operates 24 of Australia's 68 Applecentres, accounting for 40 per cent of Apple Australia's turnover. Combined sales are around AUS$85m a year.

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Companies go bust and credit insurers get nervous. We all know this. After some high-profile collapses such as Datrontech, with £18m in trade debts, credit analysts are getting tougher and credit insurers are less inclined to lose any more money. Just two resellers -Time and Dabs - have admitted to credit squeeze, but it is reasonable to infer that this is a widespread problem.

Microscope

has a

piece

on the subject - it's very short on specifics. But in the circumstances, this is just as well. The quickest way to see a struggling company go down the tubes is to tell the world it's a struggling company.

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Computacenter has won sole IT product supply rights to the Post Office, in a deal worth a claimed £40m a year,

Microscope reports

. The company has managed the Post Office account in tandem with ICL Multivendor Computing since 1998. ICL disputes the value of the contract and says it withdrew because the value of the business was declining.

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