Private equity firm TA Associates is in advanced discussions to buy Unit4 NV, the enterprise software company owned by Advent International, for more than $2 billion, according to people familiar with the matter.
A final agreement hasn’t been reached and talks could still fall apart, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the information was private.
Last year, Advent revived plans to sell Netherlands-based Unit4 after receiving takeover interest from a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, Bloomberg News has reported. A spokesperson for TA Associates couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. Representatives for Advent and Unit4 declined to comment.
Unit4, which Advent agreed to acquire for around 1.2 billion euros ($1.4 billion) in 2013, saw revenue rise 5% in 2019 to $413 million. Advent had abandoned its previous attempt to sell Unit4 in 2018.
Any deal for Unit4 would add to $116 billion of transactions already announced in the global software industry this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s up 60% on the same point in 2020, the data show.
Unit4 offers cloud-based enterprise resource planning software as well as financial forecasting, payroll and student management systems. It has more than 6,000 customers in industries including professional services, the public sector, nonprofits and education, according to its website.
