Tag Archives: Information technology

Data Respons Acquires remaining 50% of TechPeople A/S

TechPeople A/S, a Danish consultancy specialist within application development, architecture and system designs as well as embedded solutions and IoT, is expected to become a fully owned subsidiary of Data Respons within 2 weeks.

“Data Respons is continuing its growth through M&A by acquiring TechPeople A/S, a Danish company we have followed closely through 50% ownership over the last 5 years. Their development and performance were contributing factors to reach full ownership. In addition to financial synergies, joint forces going forward increases our ability to take advantage of the digitalization megatrend”, says Narve Reiten, Deal Partner at Reiten & Co.

Reiten started investing in 1996 with capital from local institutional investors and family offices. Over the years Reiten have managed seven funds, of which currently three are active.

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Cherwell Software Secures $50 Million Investment from KKR to Further Advance Service Management Leadership

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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo., Feb. 27, 2017 — Cherwell Software, LLC, a leading provider of IT service management (ITSM) solutions, announced today that it has secured $50 million in funding from KKR, a global investment firm. KKR is making the investment through its Next Generation Technology Fund, which focuses on investments in software, security, Internet, digital media, and information services.

KKR joins existing Cherwell investor, Insight Venture Partners, which has made a series of investments beginning in 2012. With the support of KKR’s funding, Cherwell will accelerate research and development and make strategic investments aimed at broadening and deepening its portfolio of IT and enterprise service management offerings.

Vini Letteri, a member of KKR’s Technology, Media & Telecommunications industry team, will be joining Cherwell’s board of managers.

“The IT service management market is a large and rapidly growing sector undergoing a period of disruption as new, emerging technologies replace older legacy systems. With IT teams’ increasing importance within organizations, ensuring there is no interruption to IT services and that customer satisfaction is high are paramount to any business,” said Vini Letteri, Director, KKR. “Since its founding, Cherwell has been entirely customer-centric in its focus and is led by a seasoned, passionate, and industry-leading management team. Its platform provides unparalleled value and the ultimate flexibility to its customers to operate in any industry and in any environment—on premises, cloud, or hybrid. We are really pleased to partner with them to help accelerate Cherwell’s future growth and leadership in this dynamic industry.”

Named by IDC as the fastest growing vendor in its 2015 Worldwide Problem Management Software Market Shares report, Cherwell has become a force multiplier for IT organizations that need to become more innovative and agile, while reducing the total cost of ownership (TCO) of their service management initiatives. The ITSM market is widely known for expensive, inflexible tools supplied by vendors whose business practices are characterized by confusing licensing models and punitive pricing.

Cherwell has driven strong growth in the ITSM market by delivering:

  • A codeless platform that enables rapid solution customization and hassle-free upgrades
  • A transparent and straightforward concurrent licensing model, along with predictable, all-inclusive pricing
  • A “customers first” philosophy which has resulted in 98%+ customer satisfaction rate

“IT teams are increasingly abandoning their legacy service management tools in favor of powerful, modern, and agile solutions that empower them to confidently tackle business challenges and opportunities,” said Craig Harper, Chief Executive Officer of Cherwell. “KKR’s investment in Cherwell is validation that our core principles and areas of focus will continue to drive phenomenal growth and fulfill our goal of being the best service management solution on the planet.”

The KKR investment follows a particularly strong 2016 for Cherwell. 2016 highlights included:

  • Record bookings and a record number of new customers, including marquis brands across transportation, financial services, healthcare, retail, government, manufacturing, and higher education
  • Acquisition of Advanced Marketplace, an IT consulting firm specializing in development of business solutions for the Cherwell® Service Management platform, signaling Cherwell’s commitment to accelerate its delivery of enterprise service management solutions
  • Appointment of Craig Harper as Cherwell’s Chief Executive Officer; and Patrick Malaperiman, Vice President, EMEA
  • Establishment of strategic partnerships with Microsoft® Azure® and Amazon Web Services (AWS), demonstrating Cherwell’s continued commitment to customer choice through flexible deployment options including on-premises, SaaS hosted by Cherwell, or hosted on the public cloud—and the ability to switch any time at no cost

“Cherwell’s continued double digit market share growth can be attributed to the flexible and competitive licensing, deployment, and pricing options of its platform,” said Robert Young, Research Director, ITSM and Client Virtualization Software, IDC. “Likewise, with the company’s recent product enhancements in the performance and scalability of its platform, as well as public cloud hosting options and integrations, IDC believes that Cherwell is well positioned to increase its enterprise adoption and maintain an aggressive growth trajectory.”

About Cherwell Software

A global leader in IT and enterprise service management, Cherwell Software empowers IT to lead through the use of powerful and intuitive technology that enables better, faster, and more affordable innovation. The Cherwell® Service Management platform is built from the ground up with a unique codeless architecture that enables rapid time to value, infinite flexibility, and frictionless upgrades every time—at a fraction of the cost and complexity of legacy solutions. Because of Cherwell’s focus on delivering solutions that are easy to configure, customize, and use, IT organizations extend the Cherwell platform to solve a wide range of IT and business problems. With an unwavering commitment to putting customers first and being easy to do business with, Cherwell enjoys 98%+ customer satisfaction. Cherwell has a global network of expert partners serving customers in more than 40 countries. Corporate headquarters are in Colorado, USA, with global offices in the United Kingdom, Germany and Australia.

About KKR

KKR is a leading global investment firm that manages investments across multiple asset classes including private equity, energy, infrastructure, real estate, credit and hedge funds. KKR aims to generate attractive investment returns by following a patient and disciplined investment approach, employing world‐class people, and driving growth and value creation at the asset level. KKR invests its own capital alongside its partners’ capital and brings opportunities to others through its capital markets business. References to KKR’s investments may include the activities of its sponsored funds. For additional information about KKR & Co. L.P. (NYSE:KKR), please visit KKR’s website at www.kkr.com and follow us on Twitter @KKR_Co or #KKRTMTGrowth for related news on KKR’s TMT platform.

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Summa Equity acquires Lin Education

Summa Equity has acquired Linfre Education AB from the founder and a handful of private investors. The founder and CEO Josef Lind will reinvest the majority of his proceeds, and the management team will also invest alongside Summa Equity.

Tommi Unkuri, Partner at Summa Equity, said: “We are very excited about concluding Summa Equity’ third investment, and the first one within the investment theme Changing Demographics. This investment also fits within another of our four themes, Tech-enabled business, where Education is a core segment. Through Lin Education we will contribute to the digitalisation of the Swedish educational system. In a time when learning is more important than ever, this is a field offering important challenges, but also huge opportunities. Being part of innovative solutions to some of the pressing challenges of our time, is a fundament in Summa Equity’s investment philosophy”.

Josef Lind, Founder and CEO of Lin Education, said: “We are very pleased to have Summa Equity as our new majority owner and partner, as this will help Lin Education take the next steps in our development. We are looking forward to a collaboration whereby we will strengthen our offering, press ahead to lead the development in educational content, and further develop our organisation. In Summa Equity we find a fit not only for our business, but also for our people and stakeholders.”

Lin Education was founded in 2007 by Josef Lind, and today has several hundred thousand digital tools and IT hardware (i.e. computers, laptops, tablets, etc.) in schools and preschools all over Sweden. Lin Education also offers learning, development and digitalisation training for its customers. Many thousand people are using the Lin Education’s proprietary digital content tools for learning. The company has some 90 employees working out of offices in Gothenburg, Stockholm, Malmö, Karlstad and Umeå. Revenue was SEK 569m in 2016.

Summa Equity will support the continued development of Lin Education and assist the Company in further growth through investments to develop existing as well as new products. Lin Education is expected to benefit from the trend towards increasing digitalisation of learning, in schools and in other environments.

Ends

For more information, please contact:

Tommi Unkuri, Lead Partner, Summa Equity, +46 70 508 1196, tommi.unkuri@summaequity.com

Josef Lind, CEO, Lin Education, +46) 704 385 827, josef.lind@lineducation.se

About Lin Education

Lin Education is a Swedish Education Technology company founded in 2007 as distributor of IT hardware (i.e. computers, laptops, tablets) to Swedish schools. The Company has since also expanded into segments for digital content, training and supplementary services for a digital learning environment, and today has a position as a leader in the Swedish market for digitalisation of the educational system. Lin Education has demonstrated strong double digit revenue growth annually over the past three years.

About Summa Equity

Summa Equity was formed in 2016 by partners with a shared vision of building a leading specialised private equity firm in the Nordic lower mid-market, positioned to capture the investment opportunity provided by the thematic megatrends expected to drive growth over the long term. The Firm focuses on sectors related to four megatrend driven themes: resource scarcity, energy efficiency, changing demographics and tech-enabled businesses. Summa Equity closed its first fund in February 2017 with commitments of SEK 4.5 billion.

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Gimv leads EUR 10.3 million follow-on round to accelerate Itineris’ international growth

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GIMV

Gimv leads EUR 10.3 million follow-on round to accelerate Itineris’ international growth

Gimv and Gimv managed Gimv Arkiv Tech Fund II jointly invest EUR 7.8 million in Itineris (www.itineris.net), a Belgian software solutions company that has developed UMAX, a Microsoft-based software solution managing the meter-to-cash processes at utility companies. Next to Gimv, other existing investors PMV and CEO-founder Edgard Vermeersch jointly put EUR 2.5 million on top, lifting the total financing round to EUR 10.3 million.

With four clients in the US under contract, a strengthened leadership for the UMAX North American business, a geographical extension of its focus in Europe with several new customer wins and revenues topping EUR 43 million, 2016 was a key year for Itineris.

The funds will be used to further support the growth of the company. Next to investing in the improvement of its UMAX-solution for its existing customers, and extending its reach with new customers in both Europe and North-America, the company is also considering some acquisition opportunities.

After earlier financings in November 2013 and May 2015, this is the third investment round of Itineris in which Gimv acts as lead investor. It clearly shows Gimv’s willingness to provide larger financing tickets to ambitious entrepreneurs willing to scale up and accelerate the growth of their company in order to become  leading in their sector.

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Gimv invests in next phase of growth of MEGA International, a leading provider of Business and IT Transformation Software

GIMV

25-10-2016 07:30

Gimv acquires a 40% stake in MEGA International, a leading global software and consulting services company, which helps companies improve their business and IT agility to innovate in the digital world. MEGA’s offering has been recognized for years by customers and prominent analysts in enterprise architecture (EA), IT portfolio management (ITPM), business process analysis (BPA), and governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) markets. The other shareholders are Lucio de Risi (Founder/CEO) and the management-team of MEGA International. Over the coming years, the emphasis will be placed on the acceleration of the growth in the US, the ongoing SaaS[1]-transformation, and in extending the audience of its product offering.

MEGA International (www.mega.com) is a global software firm helping companies manage enterprise complexity by giving them an interactive view of their operations. In today’s fast-paced, and disruptive business environment, organizations must be forward-looking and agile to adapt to rapidly-changing markets, technologies, and regulatory requirements. MEGA International’s integrated set of software solutions, called HOPEX, and its consulting services, enables IT departments and/or executives gain the visibility and information they need to make the right choices for effective governance and for striking the right balance between capacity for innovation, cost optimization, and risk management when it comes to their IT strategies and digital transformation programs. MEGA has a global footprint with 8 offices around the globe (Paris – HQ, London, Berlin, Milan, Boston, Mexico, Casablanca, and Singapore). Moreover, it works with 25 business partners around the world. The company’s customers are mostly big, complex – often global – companies and government organizations, e.g. Fannie Mae, Crédit Agricole, UniCredit, Nissan, Eurocontrol, United States Department of Agriculture, SBB CFF, P&G, Gilead or Colruyt. Last year, MEGA International realized a turnover of EUR 43 million with almost 300 employees.

Gimv’s investment provides partial liquidity to the initial shareholders while preparing the company for the next phase in its development. It is the ambition in the coming 3 years’ time (i) to foster the growth among its existing clients and by signing up new customers, (ii) to establish an excellent track record in its already initiated transition to a SaaS offering, and (iii) to apply its software tools to even more applications towards a broader audience.

Gimv Smart Industries platform has a focus on innovative companies with strong technology expertise and headquarters in France, Benelux and DACH regions. During the last years, the team has built a successful track record within the sector of ICT companies, engineered products and advanced manufacturing.

Tom Van de Voorde, Partner in Gimv’s Smart Industries platform: “Globalisation, digitalisation, consolidation and regulation are driving the need for large corporations to have a clear view on and the ability to manage their IT systems. MEGA’s leadership team together with its employees have the vision and the long experience in creating value for their customers by serving their needs and increasing their competitive positioning. We are truly delighted to join this partnership.”

Lucio de Risi, CEO and Founder of MEGA International: “I am very enthusiastic about this partnership and believe Gimv can bring a lot of value through their software expertise and experience in accompanying ambitious entrepreneurs in their international growth”.

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Viking Venture invests in secure document collaboration company Xait AS

Viking Venture

Viking Venture invests in the Norwegian company Xait AS. The company has developed XaitPorter, a document collaboration and production tool used by major corporations globally.

Xait AS was founded by CEO Owe Lie-Bjelland and CFO Arnt Jørund Andreassen in 2000 and has grown to be a major player in the market for production of complex documents. The company has implemented a cloud based offering with a subscription based business model. XaitPorter is used by corporations when producing complex documents such as tenders, proposals, reports, governing documents and project documentation. The software supports both the production and formatting dimension as well as the project management, review and approval dimension of document production.

“We are impressed by the quality of the team, the product and the customers they have attracted. With more than 30% growth and 90% recurring revenue, this company is ideally positioned for further international expansion,” commented, Eivind Bergsmyr partner in Viking Venture and chairman of Xait.

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Infravia acquires a majority stake in Next Generation Data, Europe’s largest datacentre

InfraVia Capital Partners (InfraVia) and UK data centre operator Next Generation Data (NGD) today announced the acquisition by InfraVia European Fund III (“InfraVia III”) of a controlling stake
in NGD for an undisclosed amount. NGD’s founders, Simon Taylor (Chairman) and Nick Razey (CEO), will remain significant shareholders in the company. NGD opened its flagship 750,000 square feet data centre in south Wales in early 2010. The largest data centre in Europe includes its own private connection to the National SuperGrid with up to 180MW
of power (sufficient to power a city the size of Bristol) generated from 100% renewable sources.
NGD has attracted large multinational clients including a number of major Cloud Computing service providers. These require secure, resilient and scalable data processing and storage facilities for hosting Cloud, Big Data and High Performance Computing infrastructures.
Investment from InfraVia will enable NGD to accelerate future growth: it will be used for the expansion of existing UK data centre capacity including the addition of a second site and connection of further high speed transatlantic fibre communications networks. The funding will
also be made available for stepping up international sales efforts, especially in North America and Asia.

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Credo Partners invests in SYSCO

Credo Partners
Oslo/Haugesund, Monday July 4th, 2016
The Norwegian investment company Credo Partners acquires 60% of the shares in SYSCO. The founders and key employees will keep the remaining 40% of the shares.
SYSCO is a leading supplier of IT services and software to the energy utility sector.
SYSCO has established itself as a leading specialist within IT-solutions for energy utility companies– a customer segment facing significant investments, regulatory change and technological development that will drive the need for
support and upgrade of IT systems. SYSCO has a particular competitive edge
within Oracle technology, which is the technological foundation for a large part of the IT systems in the energy utility sector.
The company already has 70 of 130 power distribution companies as its customers, giving it a strong
platform for further growth. SYSCO was founded in 2004, and had revenues of NOK 162
million and EBITDA of NOK 25 million in 2015.
–
SYSCO is a highly attractive platform for further growth, within a well -defined niche for IT services and software for the Nordic energy utility sector, says Managing Partner in Credo Partners, Gudmund Killi- We been looking for a partner who can strengthen SYSCO for further growth, and Credo represents the experience and competence we truly
believe will increase our ability to execute on our ambitious goals, says Frank Vikingstad, CEO of SYSCO.
No change for employees
The new ownership in SYSCO will not have any immediate implications for the company’s employees, suppliers or customers. Today’s highly competent management will continue leading the company, and the board of directors will be strengthened by new members from Credo as well as by external industry experts.
About the transaction
Credo Invest Nr 10 AS will own ca. 60% of the shares in SYSCO.
The transaction will be closed by the end of July.
The parties have agreed not to disclose the purchase price for the shares.
About Credo Partners
Credo Partners is a Norwegian investment company, which since 2003 has developed
companies through demanding situations.
Credo is today established as a leading player in Norway for value creation in small and medium sized enterprises.
Credo Partners’ other investments include Labflex, OptimarStette, Made for Movement, Variér, LOG and Kymar,
and former investments include Stokke and ForaForm.

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Adelis creates Danish market leader in IT outsourcing by merging IT Relation, Front-data and DSI-NEXT

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Adelis

Adelis Equity Partners (“Adelis”) has acquired majority stakes in IT Relation, Front-data and DSI-NEXT. The companies’ management teams continue as minority shareholders in the new setup.

The combined businesses will be the largest provider of IT outsourcing services to small businesses in Denmark with around DKK 300 million in revenues, 200 employees and offices in Herning, Århus, Odense and Copenhagen.

”With the combination of IT Relation, Front-data and DSI-NEXT, we have made four investments and three add-on acquisitions in Denmark since establishing Adelis less than three years ago. We are impressed by the three companies’ niche focus on small businesses, their consistent growth, and their strong cultures that make them leaders in this industry,” said Steffen Thomsen of Adelis.

“This acquisition creates a strong platform for growth. We have experience with similar companies where we have focused on finding the best platform in terms of a scalable business model combined with a strong company culture and a skilled management team,” Joel Russ of Adelis added.

The three businesses will continue activities under their own brands as part of the IT Relation Front-data Group and have access to capital and knowledge that will make it possible to accelerate their positive business development.

“We are pleased and proud to be able to work with Adelis given their significant experience building strong businesses through consolidation. Furthermore, they can contribute with their insights from previous technology investments, including within hosting. We are looking forward to the cooperation,” said Henrik Kastbjerg, CEO of IT Relation.

”I am delighted that we have created a strong foundation to deliver top-class service to our customers and to attract and retain the best employees,” said Jens Søgaard, founder of Front-data.

In connection with the transaction, Henrik Kastbjerg will become Group CEO of IT Relation Front-data. Jens Søgaard will become a member of the board, which will be chaired by former CEO of KMD, Lars Monrad-Gylling.

Nykredit has provided debt financing for the transaction. Clearwater International advised IT Relation on the transaction.

Further details concerning the transaction will not be published.

For further information:

Steffen Thomsen, Adelis Equity Partners, +45 40 28 34 09, steffen.thomsen@adelisequity.com

Joel Russ, Adelis Equity Partners, +46 73 543 90 68, joel.russ@adelisequity.com

Henrik Kastbjerg, IT Relation, +45 20 69 67 00, hvk@itrelation.dk

Jens Søgaard, Front-data and DSI-NEXT, +45 27 63 85 00, js@frontdata.dk

 About IT Relation

IT Relation was founded in 2003 and within a short period, the company has become one of the leading suppliers of it outsourcing services in Denmark. IT Relation currently has 115 employees, with offices in Herning and outside Copenhagen. For more information, please visit www.itrelation.dk .

About Front-data and DSI-NEXT

Front-data and DSI-NEXT have been part of JS Holding where the two companies have built up leading positions within each of their markets, Front-data within IT Outsourcing/Hosting and DSI-NEXT within Sharepoint, .net development and business intelligence solutions. In combination, Front-data and DSI-NEXT have 95 employees and offices in Århus, Odense and Copenhagen. Please visit www.frontdata.dk and www.dsinext.dk .

About Adelis Equity Partners

Adelis is an active investor and partner in creating value at small and medium sized Nordic companies. Adelis was founded in 2012 with the goal of building the leading lower middle market investment firm in the Nordics. Adelis’ team members have extensive Private Equity experience, have invested in over 50 companies and have been members of the board in more than 50 middle market companies. Our current fund size is approximately €400 million. For more information please visit www.adelisequity.com.

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New Portfolio Company: Unacast AS

Investinor

Investinor invests in Norwegian tech startup Unacast AS.

Unacast offers the world’s largest network of beacon and proximity data, connecting the physical world to the digital for online retargeting and attribution.

“Like Google indexed the web, Unacast is indexing the physical world”, says Thomas Walle, co-founder and CEO of Unacast.

Unacast will use the newly raised funds to maintain its #1 position, as the maturing proximity industry grows to 400 million sensors in the next years

The number of beacons deployed world wide is forecasted to grow to 400 million beacons in 2020. Unacast already covers 1.4m (30%) of the world’s beacons— making Unacast the largest aggregator in the growing proximity ecosystem.

Unacast connects these data sets to global ad platforms through partnerships with marquee players such as Oracle, MediaMath, Opera, Lotame and Adform to enable digital ad retargeting based on accurate and deterministic physical behavior.

“We are impressed by how fast Unacast has established itself as the dominant integrator in the fast-growing proximity marketing space, connecting operators of physical beacon networks worldwide with the large global advertising platforms and exchanges. Unacast has more than 1.4 million (or 30%) of the world’s beacons in its network, and can offer advertisers a proximity marketing data set that is unprecedented both in scale and depth, says Investment Director Jon Øyvind Eriksen at Investinor”.

INDUSTRY KNOWLEDGE AND LIFTING POWER
Unacast has raised $5 million in a Series A financing round, with Open Ocean Capital, a leading European VC firm for software and data investments, leading the round. Investinor co-lead the round.

In addition to Open Ocean Capital and Investinor, investors in the Series A round include NYC adtech veterans Jonah Goodhart of Right Media (sold to Yahoo) and Michael Barrett, former CEO of Millennial Media, which he took public.

“The Unacast team has a tremendous vision for merchandizing proximity data and serving the data-driven ad industry,” says Michael Barrett, Unacast investor, and previous CEO of Millennial Media.

Thomas Walle continues: “Our goal is to connect all sensors in the world to one platform, and it was important for us to work with investors with industry knowledge and substantial lifting power. This new round enables us to radically accelerate our growth worldwide and scale Unacast’s platform to power the demand from the major global marketing platforms.”

ABOUT UNACAST
With 1.4 million beacons and over 50 partners, Unacast is the world’s largest network of beacon and proximity companies, connecting the physical world to the digital world. Through the Unacast PROX network, Unacast enables a scalable global solution for retailers and brands to use beacon and proximity data for online retargeting and attribution.

Thomas Walle and co-founder Kjartan Slette, were part of  the founding team behind TIDAL, the music streaming company sold to Jay Z.

Unacast is the the backend of proximity that aggregates and provides a unified platform for the proximity and advertising industry, solving the fragmentation problem to the benefit of both the supply and demand side. Unacast is the first company to enable a scalable way for retailers and brands to retarget customers online based on accurate behavior in the physical space.

Learn more at unacast.com

 

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