ERP software developer Infor Global Solutions announced May 15 its intended acquisition of SSA Global Technologies, which also makes enterprise resource planning software.
Infor has agreed to pay $19.50 a share, or about $1.4 billion, for SSA Global.
The deal is expected to close in the third quarter, pending standard regulatory and shareholder approvals; about 84 percent of SSA Global’s shareholders have agreed to support the merger.
The deal will bring together two companies that have themselves been expanding through acquisition.
SSA Global has acquired a dozen companies since a near-death experience in 2001—including Baan (then a division of Invensys), Marcam, Epiphany and most recently Provia Software.
Infor, which has acquired Datastream, Formation Systems and Mapics in the past year alone, is itself a portfolio company held by private equity firms Summit Partners and Golden Gate Capital.
“With this acquisition, Infor will become the third largest enterprise software provider in the industry with approximately $1.6 billion in revenue,” said Jim Schaper, Infor’s chairman and CEO, in a statement.
With a customer base in excess of 37,000 and an employee base of 6,800 once the two companies are combined, Infor and SSA Global intend to go head-to-head with the big guys on the block.
“From all the people I’ve met at SSA, the fabric of their company is not dissimilar to ours, so any fears that I might have had that were emotional in nature were quickly, quickly gone,” said Schaper, during a May 15 news conference.
Read the full story on eWEEK.com: Infor to Acquire SSA Global for $1.4B
