NTT Data plans more European M&As NTT Data, Japan's largest IT services company, is planning a series of acquisitions in Europe as it seeks to triple the size of its overseas business in the next two years. The company, which has 57,000 employees around the world, has acquired Cirquent in Germany, Value Team in Italy, and Keane and Intelligroup in the US over the past four years in order to create an overseas unit. "At the moment, we are number seven in the Gartner rankings of IT services companies but we have a clear ambition to be among the top five," said Thomas Balgheim, chief executive of the NTT Data overseas business. We are looking for a string of pearls of acquisitions of small and medium-sized companies to grow our geographic coverage. NTT Data made just over Y100bn (£774.6m) from its overseas business last year but wants to increase this threefold to Y300bn by 2013. Acquisitions will make up a large part of the growth and Mr Balgheim said the company would be in a position to do deals by the end of the year. Overall, the company had revenues of Y1.139tn yen in 2011 with the vast majority coming from Japan. However, Japanese IT spending has stagnant for a number of years and the company has seen a gradual decline in its Japanese revenues. The company is hoping a revamped overseas business, which competes against companies such as Logica and Capgemini and which will be staffed by 6,500 employees, will help reignite growth. Investment bankers said a number of other Japanese technology companies, such as KDDI, NEC and Hitachi, were also looking at targets in Europe. NTT Data bought Munich-based Cirquent in 2008 and Value Team last April and is still working to consolidate all these acquisitions together. Mr Balgheim said the financial crisis in Europe, which has caused many customers to stop cut spending on IT services, would provide NTT Data with an opportunity to buy companies at lower prices. "If you have a long-term strategy, a crisis provides an opportunity rather than a threat," Mr Balgheim said. He added that he was not worried about the faltering European economy affecting business. "At the end of the day, you don't sell to geographies, you sell to customers," Mr Balgheim said. NTT Data has a particular strength in the automotive sector, where it works with companies like BMW, Volkswagen and McLaren. With these companies, although some parts of the manufacturing process were carried out in Asia, theme headquarters were still in Europe - so it made sense for IT services providers to be in Europe to be close to their customers. The company has also won some pilot projects in new areas, such as a scheme for charging electric cars in Vienna.