Boss Insights - Tech M&A Round Up - 28th August 2020

NTT DATA Services to Acquire Acorio, the World’s Largest Pure-Play ServiceNow Consultancy
Plano, Texas 27th August 2020 — NTT DATA Services, a global digital business and IT services company, has entered an agreement to acquire Acorio LLC, a ServiceNow Elite Partner, to expand its capacity to drive transformative business outcomes for clients. With this acquisition, NTT DATA, also a ServiceNow Elite Partner, will add unparalleled breadth and depth of experience in the fast-growing ServiceNow ecosystem and unique industry approaches to help clients enable automated and intelligent digital workflows. Acorio will become part of a top 10 global IT services leader, creating the ability to support its clients with global delivery and an expanded portfolio and resources. “Especially now, our clients are looking to accelerate their digital transformations. Acorio is a proven leader in implementing ServiceNow and its ecosystem to automate workflows in order to unite and empower all other enterprise technology,” said Eric Clark, Chief Digital Officer, NTT DATA Services. “We believe Acorio is the most experienced and innovative partner to deliver the platform expertise and transformation needed to support modern enterprises’ rapid adoption of ServiceNow. The company’s vertical portfolio and client base complements and aligns perfectly with ours.” https://www.nttdata.com/global/en/media/press-release/2020/august/ntt-data-services-to-acquire-acorio-the-worlds-largest-pure-play-servicenow-consultancy

Cisco Announces Intent to Acquire BabbleLabs to Improve Video Meeting Experience
San Jose, California – 25th August 2020 - With the new “Work from Home” reality, unwanted background noise has become one of the most common and frustrating distractions for online calls and collaboration. To assist users in minimising unwanted noise during online meetings- - whether from barking dogs, lawn mowers, a car alarm or sirens - Cisco has announced its intent to acquire privately held BabbleLabs, headquartered in Campbell, CA. BabbleLabs uses advanced AI (Artificial Intelligence) techniques to distinguish human speech from unwanted noise, enhancing the quality of communications and conferencing applications. The BabbleLabs solution goes beyond existing noise suppression technology by distinguishing speech from background noise, filtering out background noise in real-time as well as enhancing the voice to elevate communication, regardless of language. Commenting on the deal, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Cisco Security and Applications Business Unit, Jeetu Patel,  said: “We’re thrilled to welcome BabbleLabs’ team of highly skilled engineers. Their technology is going to provide our customers with yet another important innovation – automatically removing unwanted noise - to continue enabling exceptional Webex meeting experiences.”
https://newsroom.cisco.com/press-release-content?type=webcontent&articleId=2093726

Black Knight Acquires Docverify, Expanding Fully Digital, Contactless Real Estate and Mortgage Solutions
Jacksonville, Florida – 27th Aug. 27, 2020 –  Black Knight, Inc. has announced that it has acquired DocVerify, a privately held company committed to delivering solutions that provide proof of the integrity of digital documents, enabling organizations across a wide range of industries to streamline processes, safeguard sensitive information and reduce costs. The acquisition helps accelerate Black Knight’s goal of digitizing the entirety of the real estate and mortgage continuum as DocVerify’s trusted and proven digital document verification capabilities are already seamlessly integrated with Expedite Close, Black Knight’s digital closing platform. DocVerify’s suite of capabilities includes an eNotary platform supporting both in-person electronic notarization (IPEN) as well as remote online notarization (RON) and developer tools. All solutions are built on DocVerify’s proprietary VeriVault™ Verification Platform, an unparalleled security and storage platform that verifies the content, creator, and creation date of any digital document to help eliminate the risk of forgery, fraud or theft.
https://www.blackknightinc.com/black-knight-acquires-docverify-expanding-fully-digital-contactless-real-estate-and-mortgage-solutions/

Fastly Announces Agreement to Acquire Signal Sciences for c$775 Million
San Francisco – 27th August 2020 – Fastly, Inc, provider of an edge cloud platform, has announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Signal Sciences, for approximately $775 million in cash and stock. The acquisition will expand Fastly’s robust security portfolio at a time when security at the edge has never been more critical. Signal Sciences' strong, developer-first web application and API protection solutions will bolster Fastly's existing security offerings to bring customers a unified edge security solution. Signal Sciences’ technology combined with Fastly’s current solutions will form Fastly’s upcoming new security offering, Secure@Edge. Secure@Edge will be a modern, unified web application and API protection solution that will power and protect companies looking to further or begin their digital transformation. The acquisition supports Fastly’s mission to provide simplified, secure, and frictionless solutions at scale, and to transform the security landscape by offering an alternative to the existing array of opaque, fragmented and inflexible solutions needed to protect web applications and APIs.
https://www.fastly.com/press/press-releases/fastly-announces-agreement-acquire-signal-sciences

Emerson Expands Commitment to Advanced Software Solutions with Agreement to Purchase Open Systems International, Inc. (OSI Inc.) for $1.6 Billion
St Louis – 27th August 2020 – Emerson has announced it has agreed to acquire Open Systems International, Inc. (OSI Inc.) for $1.6 billion in an all cash transaction. OSI Inc. is an operations technology software provider that broadens and complements Emerson’s robust software portfolio and ability to help customers in the global power industry, as well as other end markets, in their quest to transform and digitize operations to more seamlessly incorporate renewable energy sources and improve energy efficiency and reliability. The acquisition will equip customers with the end-to-end ability to monitor, control and optimize real-time operations across the power enterprise through scalable, software-enabled automation and data management. Executive President of Emerson’s Automation Solutions business, Lal Karsanbhai, said: “An enormous change is underway as utilities globally are investing to digitize the grid and adapt to rapidly evolving energy sources and new technologies that increase consumer choices. This acquisition will help the power industry maximize the remarkable opportunity to harness renewable energy sources and to accelerate the transformation to the smart power grid. Emerson now has the opportunity to be a leader in this large, rapidly growing market with a compelling and complete software and technology offering.”
https://www.emerson.com/en-us/news/corporate/osiinc-agreement

Change Healthcare Acquires PROMETHEUS Analytics®
Nashville, Tennessee – 26th August 2020 - Change Healthcare has announced it has acquired PROMETHEUS Analytics® from Altarum. PROMETHEUS Analytics is a reimbursement approach, based on medical episodes of care, used by payer-provider collaborations nationwide, uniquely providing a fair and realistic blueprint for value-based payments. This transaction supports Change Healthcare’s commitment to focus on and invest in core aspects of the business to fuel long-term growth, advance innovation and accelerate the industry’s transition to value-based care. Healthcare organizations use PROMETHEUS Analytics to optimize their provider networks under value-based care reimbursement models. They create unique analytic insights that help improve provider performance and provide consumers more value from their health care experience. PROMETHEUS Analytics is integrated into Change Healthcare’s HealthQX® value-based care platform that enables health plans to optimize payment models, evaluate provider performance, identify care variations, and improve network efficiency.
https://newsroom.changehealthcare.com/press-releases/change-healthcare-acquires-prometheus-analytics-

AVEVA and OSIsoft Combine Accelerating Digital Transformation of Industrial World
London, UK and San Leandro, California - 25th August 2020 - AVEVA, a global company, specialising in industrial software, and OSIsoft, a global specialist in real-time industrial data software and services, have announced an agreement for AVEVA to acquire OSIsoft for $5.0 billion. AVEVA and OSIsoft will combine their complementary product offerings, bringing together industrial software and data management to help customers in industrial and essential organizations accelerate their digital transformational strategies as efficiency, flexibility, sustainability and resilience become increasingly urgent requirements for customers. Commenting on the agreement, Craig Hayman, CEO of AVEVA, said: “Combining AVEVA and OSIsoft is yet another significant milestone in our journey to achieving the ambitious growth goals that we have set. This will not only help us serve existing customers better but also open the flood gates to new opportunities which will accelerate the delivery of our digitization vision. This agreement will enable our customers to improve business processes as well as eliminate inefficiencies. We are extremely proud to be moving into the next chapter with an even stronger solutions portfolio as well as an ever-increasing and robust customer base which continues to make us leaders in our sector.”
https://www.aveva.com/en/about/news/press-releases/2020/aveva-and-osisoft-combine-accelerating-digital-transformation/

Banzai Acquires High Attendance to Add Virtual, Hybrid Event Management Solution
Austin, Texas & Seattle - Banzai, a SaaS platform for event marketing, has announced the acquisition of High Attendance, a provider of virtual and hybrid event management software for the enterprise. Banzai plans to integrate its flagship marketing automation platform, Banzai Reach, with High Attendance’s virtual and hybrid event management platform to give Banzai customers - including Adobe, Chef Software, Dell, Pure Storage, and other large enterprises throughout all industries - a seamless experience for growing and engaging their audiences. CMO at Chef Software, Brian Goldfarb, said: “Currently the event marketing landscape is a mess. It’s littered with half-baked solutions that were not built with marketers’ unique needs and desires in mind. It is exciting to see Banzai continue to invest in building out their offerings to help create, promote, manage and produce events.” Christopher Justice, founder and former CEO of High Attendance, said: "We are incredibly excited to bring together tools that will enhance the success of event marketers to deliver unique and customizable experiences that drive brand awareness and lead generation."
https://www.getbanzai.com/blog/banzai-and-high-attendance/

ConsenSys Acquires Quorum® Platform from J.P. Morgan
New York, NY - 25th August 2020 - Blockchain software company, ConsenSys, has announced the acquisition of Quorum®, an enterprise-variant of the Ethereum blockchain developed by JP Morgan. With the addition of Quorum, ConsenSys now offers a full range of products, services and support for Quorum, accelerating the availability of features and capabilities—such as digital asset functionality and document management. ConsenSys will merge its existing protocol engineering roadmap with Quorum, leveraging the best of both codebases. All Enterprise Ethereum protocol technology at ConsenSys will fall under the ConsenSys Quorum brand, and developers will have the option to choose their underlying technology stack. Quorum will remain open source and become interoperable with ConsenSys’ other leading blockchain products, such as Codefi’s finance and commerce application suite. J.P. Morgan will be a customer of ConsenSys’ advanced features and services deployed on Quorum.
https://consensys.net/blog/press-release/consensys-acquires-quorum-platform-from-jp-morgan/

iManage Acquires Legal Transaction Management Expert, Closing Folders
Chicago – 24th August 2020 – iManage, the company dedicated to transforming how professionals work, has announced it has acquired legal transaction management (LTM) company, Closing Folders. The acquisition uniquely enables iManage to deliver automation and governance over transactions and deal documents from creation to closing, enabling dramatic improvement in efficiency for transactional practices while delivering unparalleled security and governance. Transactions make up a large portion of law firm matters and legal department work. The closing processes associated with them are typically manual, error-prone, expensive and complex. They require the coordination of hundreds of documents, frequent revisions and numerous signatures and tasks across many parties – often under tight timelines – with clients frequently frustrated by a lack of visibility of closing status and processes. Together, iManage and Closing Folders deliver powerful capabilities to ease the burden of document and transaction management from end-to-end. The innovative SaaS offering is intuitive and requires no deployment services – making it both easy to adopt and transformational for law firms and organizations of all sizes.
https://imanage.com/resource/imanage-acquires-closing-folders-leader-in-legal-transaction-management-combination-yields-best-in-class-integrated-document-and-transaction-management/

Cognizant to Acquire Tin Roof Software to Expand Digital Engineering Services
Teaneck, NJ – 25th August 2020 - Cognizant has entered into an agreement to acquire Tin Roof Software, a privately-held custom software and digital product development services company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Tin Roof specializes in innovative digital products that allow companies to improve customer experiences and increase revenue. The acquisition will expand Cognizant's software product engineering footprint in the U.S. and connect Tin Roof's experts with Cognizant's broader global software development capabilities. Tin Roof offers software design, development, DevOps, and delivery services for clients increasingly dependent on software for a competitive edge. Custom solutions for Fortune 500 clients and others include re-architecting and migrating products to the cloud, building customer-facing web and mobile apps, creating APIs and data pipelines for transaction processing, and designing secure payment processing systems. Tin Roof works across a range of industries, including telecom, media and entertainment, financial services, retail, hospitality, consumer products, travel, logistics, and transportation.
https://news.cognizant.com/2020-08-25-Cognizant-to-Acquire-Tin-Roof-Software-to-Expand-Digital-Engineering-Services

VIAVI Acquires Expandium to Complete Virtualized Assurance Portfolio
San Jose, California – 25th August 2020 – VIAVI Solutions Inc. has announced that it has acquired Expandium, a provider of core network monitoring and assurance solutions powered by big data, based in Saint-Herblain, France. This acquisition augments VIAVI’s leading network assurance portfolio with a cloud-native virtualized solution offering, in alignment with virtualization initiatives at Tier-1 service providers worldwide. In order to manage operations and customer experience across generations of technology, between wireless and wireline networks, and into new domains such as IoT and V2X, carriers are moving away from proprietary hardware to software-defined services running on off-the-shelf servers. The network itself becomes disaggregated, no longer a topology of discrete nodes, but a more dynamic and shapeable environment which can adapt to rapidly changing demand. The entire ecosystem supporting the network must evolve accordingly, replacing hardware-based solutions with containerized virtual machines which can respond dynamically as the network shifts.
https://www.viavisolutions.com/en-uk/news-releases/command-5g-network-viavi-acquires-expandium-complete-virtualized-assurance-portfolio

GreenVision Acquisition Corp. Announces Merger Agreement with Accountable Healthcare America, Inc
New York & Fort Lauderdale, Florida – 27th August 2020 - GreenVision Acquisition Corp. (GRNV), a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), has announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement for a business combination with Accountable Healthcare America, Inc. (AHA), a growth-oriented, technology-enabled population health management company. The transaction will introduce AHA as a Nasdaq-listed public company. Upon closing of the transaction, it is expected that GreenVision will be renamed AHA Healthcare and remain on the Nasdaq Stock Market, listed under a new ticker symbol. Assuming full redemption of the GreenVision IPO trust funds, the transaction implies an initial enterprise value for the combined company of approximately $150 million, or 8.5x AHA’s estimated 2020 EBITDA of $17.6 million and 6.6 times AHA’s projected 2021 EBITDA of $22.6 million. Assuming no redemption of the GreenVision IPO trust funds, the post-merger company will have an initial market capitalization of approximately $ 127 million.
https://seekingalpha.com/pr/17985778-greenvision-acquisition-corp-announces-merger-agreement-accountable-healthcare-america-inc

Palo Alto Networks Announces Intent to Acquire The Crypsis Group for $265 Million
Santa Clara, California – 24th August 2020 - Global cybersecurity company, Palo Alto Networks, has announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire incident response, risk management and digital forensics consulting firm, The Crypsis Group. Under the terms of the agreement, Palo Alto Networks will acquire The Crypsis Group for a total purchase price of $265 million, subject to adjustment, to be paid in cash. The proposed acquisition is expected to close during Palo Alto Networks’ fiscal first quarter, subject to the satisfaction of regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. Commenting on the deal, Nikesh Arora, Chairman and CEO, Palo Alto Networks, said: "The proposed acquisition of The Crypsis Group will significantly enhance our position as the cybersecurity partner of choice, while expanding our capabilities and strengthening our Cortex strategy. By joining forces, we will be able to help customers not only predict and prevent cyberattacks but also mitigate the impact of any breach they may face."
https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/company/press/2020/palo-alto-networks-announces-intent-to-acquire-the-crypsis-group

FARO® has Acquired ATS AB
LAKE MARY, Fla., Aug. 21, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- FARO Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: FARO), a global leader for 3D measurement, imaging and realization solutions for 3D Metrology, AEC (Architecture, Engineering & Construction), and Public Safety Analytics, today announced that the Company has acquired Advanced Technical Solutions in Scandinavia AB ("ATS"), a Swedish-based leader in 3D digital twin solution technology. FARO President & CEO, Michael Burger, said: "We believe this acquisition enables FARO with differentiated accuracy and speed, which we believe will accelerate the adoption of digital twin technology. High accuracy 3D digital twin simulations allow capital intensive industries such as automotive and aerospace to meaningfully reduce their time to market and cost. I welcome the ATS team into FARO and believe they will help accelerate our strategic objective of increasing cloud based subscription offerings in this sizable market." 
https://www.faro.com/en-sg/about-faro/investor-relations/financial-press-release/

28 August 2020
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