Castle Street Investments plc has acquired C4L Group Holdings Limited

Castle Street Investments plc, is pleased to announce that it has acquired C4L Group Holdings Limited, a successful and growing network services and data centre hosting business, for a total consideration of £20.2 million in cash and shares.

Highlights:

• Acquisition of C4L is a key component in building out Castle Street's platform
• C4L brings a high quality core network infrastructure with substantial capacity for growth and a broad data centre infrastructure
• 45 staff based in Bournemouth and Docklands, C4L provides services to over 800 customers (primarily in the UK), over 90% of its revenues are recurring
• C4L's current trading in the three months to 31 January 2016 has delivered an annualised turnover of £14m and run rate EBITDA of £2m with further growth expected
• The acquisition will be immediately earnings enhancing and, in line with the Company's strategy, will facilitate a broader integrated service offering to a larger client base while focusing on delivering higher margin services
• Mathew Hawkins, C4L Chairman and Founder, and Simon Mewett, C4L CEO, will join the Board of Castle Street Investments PLC as Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and Chief Operating Officer (COO) respectively.

Founded in 2000, C4L is a successful and growing network services and data centre hosting business. C4L owns and manages core network infrastructure and data centre assets, including:

• coreTX™ - one of the UK's largest privately owned 100Gbps MPLS network built on modern Juniper technology
• coreTX™ is ready for the next generation of software defined networking ("SDN"); offering a substantial advantage over most legacy networks
• fibre connectivity into over 50 data centres across the UK
• a 3MW data centre in Bournemouth
• one of the UK's largest on-net DDoS Cloud protection platforms available in 50% of the UK's data centres
• PortaOne - a carrier grade VoIP platform.

Andy Ross, CEO of Castle Street, commented: "C4L combined with our recent acquisition of Selection Services demonstrates the progress we are making towards becoming an integrated IT Services and Cloud provider. C4L has a high quality, next generation infrastructure which has been well invested. Allied to a successful business with high levels of recurring revenue it offers strong growth opportunities. The enlarged customer base and product portfolio strengthen and consolidate our position in the industry and as a Board we are excited by this Acquisition which supports the next step in the Company's development.

Jonathan Watts, Chairman of Castle Street added: "Matt and Simon have done an excellent job in building C4L. We welcome them to the Board and look forward to their contribution as we continue to execute on our focused growth strategy."