2000 onwards
2000
In January the Group announced the acquisition of Ei System, the leading specialist PC retailer in Spain and Portugal, to take advantage of the rapidly growing PC market in these countries.
March 2000 saw the opening of a state of the art customer contact centre in Sheffield, creating 2,000 new jobs.
European activity continued in April when the Group acquired a 15% stake in leading Greek electrical retailer, P.Kotsovolos, with stores in Greece and the Czech Republic.
The Group was named as the Company of the Year in the Sunday Times/Natwest Business Enterprise awards in June.
In July, the Group showed underlying profit before tax increasing by 11% to £263.7 million.
A strategic partnership was formed with eMachines, a leading supplier of PCs to the US market in August, making Dixons Group stores the exclusive supplier of eMachine PCs to third party retailers in a number of European countries.
Omni Source, a new Group company was created to focus on the sourcing of own brand and directly sourced products for the Group's European retail market.The Group continued to bring the latest technology to UK customers with the launch of digital radio (the Psion WaveFinder) and TiVo, the intelligent personal video recorder in October.
E-commerce development resulted in new websites for Currys and The Link and improved functionality on the PC World and Dixons Online sites in December.
2001
In January the Group reported interim results showing profit before tax of £90.8 million. The sale of Freeserve to Wanadoo, part of France Telecom, enabled the Group to concentrate on its retail markets while taking a shareholding in a leading media company. The UK's largest online electrical superstore - currys.co.uk - was also launched in January.
In March PC World Business opened new headquarters in Bury, Lancashire to meet the growth in business demand for new technology.
In April the Group announced its sponsorship of the UK's first chair in entrepreneurship and innovation at Edinburgh University.
PC World launched the first ever 1GHz laptop by own brand Advent as well as the UK's first PC with a recordable DVD. In the same month Dixons reported that sales of digital cameras had outstripped traditional 35mm cameras for the first time.
Elkjøp acquired SuperRadio, creating Denmark's leading out of town electrical retailer.
The full year results in July showed underlying profit before tax increasing by 5% to £277.8 million. The Group announced its intention to create 1,300 new jobs over the 2001/02 financial year.
In July Sir John Collins was appointed a deputy chairman of the Group. The Board announced its intention that Sir John would succeed Sir Stanley Kalms as Group Chairman when he becomes President in September 2002.
In August Currys unveiled its new branding initiative, the "Currys - no worries" theme to coincide with a major TV advertising campaign focusing around "the Currys family".
In September the Group launched a new charitable campaign - "Health Matters" - to support a consortium of four health charities: Breast Cancer Campaign, The Stroke Association, The Prostate Cancer Charity and the MS Society.
In November, PC City in France boosted its online presence with the opening of two new superstores in Villebon and Plaisir, close to Paris.
In the same month, readers of the Sunday Telegraph judged Sir Stanley Kalms to be the Sunday Telegraph Chairman of the Year for his outstanding business career and his contribution to British retailing.
At the end of November, the Group acquired a 24% stake in UniEuro, a leading independent retailer of consumer electronics and domestic appliances in Italy.
2002
Senior management changes at the beginning of the year reflected the Group's focus on growth in Europe and the UK.
The opening of the first Electro World store in Budapest, Hungary, in the Spring attracted huge crowds and made the headlines in the Hungarian press. In September the Group opened its first PC City in Italy near Milan. A few weeks later, the Group purchased a further 72% stake in UniEuro, Italy's leading independent electrical retailer, taking its total holding to 96%.
Back in the UK, Dixons xL, the largest store in the chain, was opened in Cardiff City Centre. The 26,000 sq ft store, arranged over two floors, is ten times bigger than the average Dixons store.
At The Link, Newry, Ashling Kearney celebrated winning the best small store manager of the year award in the 2002 Retail Week honours in March.
Currys kicked off a major household safety drive in April. The Switched on to Safety campaign was designed to help cut the number of accidents involving electrical products.
The Group purchased mobile phone service provider Genesis Communications to develop its position in the business to business mobile communications market.
In June, the Group announced full year results showing underlying profit before tax up 7% at £297.2 million.
Chairman Sir Stanley Kalms was awarded two honorary degrees from Buckingham and Sheffield Universities. At the Group's AGM in September, Sir Stanley stepped down from the Board to become President. Sir John Collins succeeded him as Chairman.
2003
The Link led two innovative campaigns. The Immobilise campaign was an initiative to crack down on mobile phone crime. It was the first of its kind, involving the police, the government and the mobile phone industry. The Group's crime prevention initiatives won special commendation at the Mobile Choice magazine awards.
Community Fonebak was Britain's first nationwide mobile phone recycling scheme, helping to fund small charities and community shops.
Currys launched the Fridgesavers scheme in partnership with Powergen. Under this scheme householders claiming benefit were offered a brand new energy-efficient fridge or fridge-freezer at very low cost.
PC Servicecall, the Group's Nottingham-based call centre employed a group of Nordic nationals to provide dedicated technical support to home PC owners in Sweden, Norway and Denmark. The team includes native speakers from Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Iceland.
In June the Group announced full year results showing underlying profit before tax up 1% to £301.3 million.
PC City opened its thirteenth Spanish store in Catalonia, north-west Spain. Sweden's first ever PC City store was opened in Sickla, Stockholm.
Back in the UK two Dixons xL stores were opened in Swansea and Birmingham to queues of 4,000 people each.
Sir Stanley Kalms, who became President of the Group last September, won the first ever lifetime achievement award at the 2003 Retail Week Awards. He was praised by judges for creating a culture of change, innovation and professionalism.
