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March 27, 2006
Logicalis Announces Intent to Acquire Alliance Consulting Southwest Region
Strategic Acquisition Strengthens West Coast, Southwest Presence; Expands Business Consulting Capabilities

Bloomfield Hills, MI - March 27, 2006 - Logicalis, Inc., a global provider of high-performance technology solutions, today announced plans to acquire Alliance Consulting's Southwest region business ("Alliance Southwest"), based in Phoenix, Arizona. The acquisition will strengthen the West coast and Southwest presence and capabilities of the Logicalis Contract Consulting Services Group (CCSG) by adding 70 consultants and increasing CCSG's revenue to an estimated $50 million in the coming fiscal year, making it one of the region's largest independent providers of technology solutions.

On completion of the acquisition, Logicalis will boast 250 service delivery consultants who have obtained over 1,500 technical certifications, enabling the company to service all of its customers' high-performance technology requirements.

"This latest acquisition demonstrates Logicalis' commitment to enhancing and increasing our ability to deliver and integrate high-performance technology solutions for our customers," said Mike Cox, President and CEO, Logicalis North American operations. "We welcome the talented Alliance Southwest account managers, solution architects, consultants and support team, and the long-term customer relationships they will bring with them."

"The Logicalis CCSG strategy, focus and culture is a great match with the Alliance Southwest business and we believe Logicalis will provide a seamless transition for our Southwest region employees and clients. We look forward to partnering with Logicalis in areas where our two companies complement one another," said Anthony Ibargüen, Alliance Consulting's President and CEO.

In addition to providing its business customers with increased geographical reach, Logicalis will add significant new solutions to its services portfolio, including:

  • SAP and Oracle Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Services
  • Application Rationalization and Consolidation Consulting
  • Business Intelligence and Data Management Services
  • Onshore-Offshore Outsourcing
  • Testing and Quality Assurance (QA) Services
Similarly, existing Alliance Southwest customers will be able to take advantage of Logicalis' strong services and capabilities, including:
  • Data Center Design and Migration
  • Microsoft Gold Competency Certification in Infrastructure and Application Development
  • Sybase/BEA/IBM Software Partnerships
  • Mobility (including Wireless Telco OSS/BSS and Data Services Expertise)
  • POS and Billing Software Frameworks
  • ActiveSymbolsTM Camera Phone Branding Technology
  • IP/Telephony Application Development
  • VMS (Vendor Management System) Outsourcing Solution
"One Logicalis" Pricing Value-Proposition
Logicalis provides customers with a single, independent consulting organization that can support their heterogeneous hardware, software and IT services requirements. Customers can take advantage of significant savings, with the ability to earn up to 4 percent in volume purchasing rebates across the company's product and services portfolio.

The Alliance Southwest division will become part of the Logicalis CCSG business and be led by Chris Rafter, currently vice president of consulting services for Alliance, and Marney Edwards, currently Alliance's vice president of sales for the Western Region.

Rafter is an industry-recognized expert on Object-Orientated Technologies, J2EE and the use of technology in enterprise computing environments. He has more than 14 years experience working with Fortune 500 clients designing and building enterprise systems in areas including financial services business process management, business intelligence, operations workflow management, and B2B electronic commerce. Rafter is a BEA Certified J2EE Integration Architect and a member of the Worldwide Association of Software Architects. He holds an MBA in Finance and Management from New York University's Stern School of Business.

Edwards is a technology business executive who has succeeded in start-up businesses, venture-funded enterprises and publicly traded corporations by leveraging strong relationship and sales leadership skills. He brings 14 years of sales, business development and sales management skills to his new role, and is well-known for his client-centric approach and an innate understanding of key business drivers. He holds a Juris Doctor and Bachelor of Business Administration from Baylor University.

Both men will report to Logicalis Chief Technology Officer, Jeff Reed.

"The addition of these talented individuals from the Alliance Southwest Region underscores Logicalis' commitment to the services we provide our customers and the truly unique business model we are driving in the VAR and Staffing community," said Reed. "Together the combined CCSG team will be able to offer a very broad portfolio, including hardware, software and services, to our customers."

The company expects to complete the acquisition during the next 60 days.

About Alliance Consulting
Alliance Consulting delivers IT consulting and software solutions to targeted clients worldwide. Alliance Consulting's solutions encompass strategic IT and business intelligence consulting, custom application development and packaged software integration, data warehouse integration and application management outsourcing. Alliance Consulting is a wholly owned subsidiary of Safeguard Scientifics, Inc.

About Logicalis
Logicalis is a global provider of high-performance technology solutions. Logicalis and its affiliated companies employ 1,000 people worldwide, including highly-trained service specialists who specify, design, deploy and manage IT infrastructure to meet the needs of over 5,000 corporate and public sector customers. Logicalis maintains strong partnerships with technology leaders such as HP, IBM, Cisco and EMC.

Logicalis is a part of Logicalis Group, a division of Datatec Limited (JSE: DTC), a $3 billion business listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. With its international headquarters in the UK, Logicalis Group will have annualized global revenues of approximately $700 million from operations in the U.S., UK, Germany and South America. In North America, Logicalis' annualized revenues will amount to some $450 million with nearly 400 employees in the U.S. For more information, visit www.us.logicalis.com.