iOCO buys Astraia in second deal in four months as turnaround holds
What's the deal? South Africa's iOCODealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has acquired Cape Town-based cloud enterprise resource planning (ERP) specialist Astraia TechnologyDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → for an undisclosed sum. It is iOCO's second acquisition in four months, following its purchase of the MySky Group of Companies in March.
Who's Astraia? Founded in 2010 by chartered accountant David Bryant, the company handles cloud ERP implementations, financial software integration, and business process optimisation. It serves customers across South Africa, the Middle East, and Africa, with Bryant as chief executive officer.
The terms: The agreement could include a performance-based earn-out if growth targets are met over the next 18 months, iOCO said in a note to shareholders. It expects the deal to close within six weeks of the binding agreement, subject to standard conditions.
What's the endgame? iOCO says the deal will enhance its "infrastructure and managed services capabilities" and broaden its access to enterprise customers and vendor ecosystems. Chief executive officer Rhys Summerton said smaller acquisitions "who can access iOCO's diverse and broad platform allow immediate scalability across products and customers."
Why now? iOCO rebranded from EOH in December 2024, after a 2019 ENSafrica investigation uncovered governance failures and around R1.2 billion in suspicious transactions, largely tied to public sector contracts. Having finished cost rationalisation and decentralisation by January 2026, it has shifted focus to capital allocation and growth.
The numbers: For the first half of its current financial year, iOCO reported profit of R180 million, up 45.6%, on revenue of R2.8 billion. For the full year to July 2025, it posted net profit of R258 million — its first full-year profit since the EOH era. The group carried no overdraft and cut interest paid on bank debt to R27 million for the half-year, from R39 million a year earlier.
What could go wrong? iOCO shares are up just 1.3% over five years. The company said it is highly unlikely to pay dividends, instead returning cash through buybacks; it repurchased more than 6.4 million shares between August 2025 and January 2026.
The signal: After selling eight legacy EOH businesses between November 2023 and July 2024, iOCO is now buying rather than shedding. The strategy targets managed services, cloud, cyber security, digital transformation, and infrastructure — a bid to turn a stabilised balance sheet into regional expansion.
Read more: ITWeb
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