At the beginning of the quarter, i3 Business Solutions acquired the assets of Computer Alliance (CAI), an IBM-system reseller in Farmington Hills, Michigan. Mike Ritsema, President of i3, and Joe Love, Owner of CAI, go back 15 years and have a common history with IBM, so when Joe reached out to Mike, they began discussing a business transition.
“After 20 years with IBM in sales and management positions and 30 years as CEO of Computer Alliance, I decided it is time to retire and spend time with my family and relax in Florida.
I am proud of our loyal team at CAI, as they have been responsible for our success. I am pleased that they will be able to continue supporting our clients and customers in a professional manner,” said Joe Love.
Since its founding in 2004, our team at i3 Business Solutions has been perfecting managed services and professional IT consulting in the Grand Rapids and West Michigan area. By acquiring Computer Alliance, the company will strengthen and extend its existing presence to the East side of Michigan.
"There’s great synergy for CAI’s services to our IBM accounts and opportunity for i3 to expand its managed network and cloud services beyond the accounts we already share. Both of our companies’ share IBM roots going back to 1992. The opportunity to help Joe and the CAI team was compelling,” Ritsema said.
With the help from CAI’s talented staff, i3 Business Solutions will be expanding its IBM System i – AS/400 operations and RPG – SQL programming services.