Planned merger with Tibco: Investors take over Citrix for $16.5 billion
Photo: viewimage – shutterstock.com
The Investors Vista Equity Partners and Evergreen Coast Capital acquire Citrix for $104 per share. This corresponds to a premium of 30 percent on the share price in the days before December 7, 2021 – i.e. before there was speculation about a sale of the provider of infrastructure and security software for the first time. The purchase price is thus a total of 16.5 billion dollars.
With Citrix the investors have an ambitious goal: After the takeover, they want it with the company that already belongs to Vista Equity Partners Tibco merge into one company. This should create one of the world’s largest software companies. The previously very different product portfolio of software and hardware for infrastructure and security at Citrix on the one hand and data management and visualization, analytics (Jaspersoft, Spotfire) and middleware (cloud integration, API management and business process management/BPM) at Tibco on the other hand should then be merged into one.
When Investors see the advantage of the transactionthat Citrix can accelerate its transformation into a SaaS provider and expand its positioning as a provider of secure hybrid workplaces. After the takeover, Citrix is delisted. The investors have not yet made any statements about the details of the hoped-for synergies from the two quite different product offerings and possible additional perspectives for Citrix’s numerous channel partners. However, Tibco’s channel has so far been manageable, even if the provider has been making more efforts to indirect sales for a good two years.
Photo: Bob Calderoni/Reseller News IDG
The investors point out that the merger will create one of the world’s largest software providers. The combined company will have around 400,000 customers, including almost all of the Fortune 500 companies. Its software is used by 100 million users in 100 countries.
“The combined company will be well positioned to provide complete, secure and optimized infrastructure for enterprise application and desktop delivery and data management to advance hybrid cloud strategies and meet the needs of today’s enterprise,” the investors said.
It almost sounds as if Tibco’s previous strategy is being abandoned and its technology is being used more or less as extensive support for optimizing the Citrix products. This is also indicated by a statement by Dan Streetman, CEO of TIBCO, in the press release on the acquisition hin “We are thrilled to be able to bring our industry-leading solutions to Citrix customers worldwide. The workplace has changed forever and companies will need real-time access from anywhere to get faster and better insights into ever-larger data sets.”
Bob Calderoni, Chair of the Citrix Board of Directors and interim Chief Executive Officer and President, also notes that Citrix as a future privately held company will have greater financial and strategic flexibility – for example, to invest in areas such as DaaS and continue its transformation into a cloud provider. From Citrix’s point of view, the transaction already has one good thing: The discussions about a possible takeover by Microsoft, which he believes have been tiresome and have been going on for years, should be off the table.
more on the subject
Channel Excellence Awards 2022: The best software providers
Tibco wants to approach partners more closely
Citrix and Nutanix deepen collaboration
Citrix Secure Private Access: Zero Trust für das Homeoffice
Overview: Desktop as a Service in indirect sales
Reference-www.channelpartner.de