As concerns about the Covid-19 Delta variant and slowed vaccination rates loom large in the public consciousness, many companies are still keeping their workforce (at least partially) based at home. As such, there have been a number of deals centered around companies that offer better ways to consolidate and share essential information within a team structure. The growth in this space was particularly highlighted in three deals.
The most recent of these deals was noted yesterday. Symplr, an enterprise healthcare operations business that offers governance, risk management, and compliance software services, has acquired SpinFusion, a healthcare scheduling software provider with a focus on physician scheduling. The company will join Symplr’s portfolio of workforce management offerings. Symplr is backed by Clearlake Capital Group and Charlesbank Capital Partners.
Earlier in the week, Primus Capital made a significant growth equity investment in Bloomfire, a knowledge engagement software company. Bloomfire CEO Mark Hammer spoke with Mergers & Acquisitions about the deal and the broader appeal he saw in this booming market segment.
“Companies have come to us and said oh my gosh we’re now in this real panic because all of our workers are working from home,” says Hammer, outlining the demand for his company and others like it. “They don’t have access to tap somebody on the shoulder next to them and ask them a simple question because that person has been there for three years and they just arrived. Wouldn’t it be great if we could take all their knowledge and put it into a platform so that everybody could as successful as that person who’s been there for three years?”
“I think Primus recognized that this is a real need for this company,” he comments about the investment. “And there is a trend. It’s crazy when you think about deficiencies that companies have when employees arrive and spend all this time searching for information that should be right at their fingertips. Companies are now, because of the situation we’re all in working from home, recognizing that they need to leverage platforms that give their employees this capability.”
“I think working from home is going to continue,” he concludes. “But even those companies that bring employees back together are still going to want to solve this problem. There’s still going to want to make their employees successful and give them the tools to be successful, and this is one of them.”
Finally, Pro Unlimited, a workforce management software supplier, has, through an agreement with EQT Private Equity, agreed to acquire Workforce Logiq from funds managed by The Carlyle Group. Workforce Logiq offers AI-powered workforce intelligence, technology, and services to large corporations.
Sidley Austin partner Brien Wassner, who represented Pro in the deal, sees a similar trajectory. “Work from home has been a positive impact for the industry because people can now be hired from anywhere,” Wassner says “Contingent workforce providers such as Pro provide data/analytics offerings to help employers find the best talent at the best rates, regardless of where they are in the world.”
I fully expect to see more PE deals in this area, as we continue to figure out the most effective way to work from home. Have any workforce tech deals come across your desk? Send me an email with your thoughts at: [email protected]
–John Melendez
