1st M&A blog of FY25 with 2 SCD deals!

1.?????? Banyan Software acquires Viostream - SCD Advisory on the sell-side

Banyan Software, a leading acquirer and permanent home for great enterprise software businesses, is excited to announce the acquisition of Viostream from Atlas Equity Partners and Bloom Equity Partners. Established for over 20 years, Viostream is a leading Australian provider of a centralized video library platform allowing users to group, organize and tag videos. Its video hosting transforms the way companies manage content online with unmatched enterprise security. Businesses have a wide range of uses for video, whether it be sharing an internal team call, communicating a product on the website, sharing a pitch deck for potential customer or investor communications. Viostream offers a highly secure, smooth painless user experience to manage all video content.

2. Attura acquires Exent - SCD Advisory acting as sell-side adviser

Atturra to acquire Exent to bolster its digital and transformation advisory and consulting capabilities Atturra, a leading advisory and technology services business in designing, implementing, and maintaining IT solutions, has exchanged a share sale agreement (“SSA”) to acquire Exent through the Company’s subsidiary, Atturra Advisory. Headquartered in Brisbane, Exent is an advisory and consulting services firm specialising in strategy to implementation business transformation advisory in vendor neutral, client-side technology, people, and business processes. Exent specialises in business transformation projects that span people, process, technology, and data, with a highly experienced team across advisory and delivery. The transaction is expected to complete on or around 31 July 2024, subject to the satisfaction of conditions precedent in the SSA.

3.?????? Findex expands in regional Queensland following Mercury investment

Professional services firm Findex has expanded its footprint in regional Queensland through the acquisitions of Avance and Schuh Group, deals which follow its investment from Mercury Capital. Concentrated in the Wide Bay – Burnett region north of Brisbane, the back-to-back acquisitions add offices in Maryborough, Gayndah, Hervey Bay, Kingaroy and Gympie and roughly one and a half dozen senior personnel. The additions follow Mercury Capital’s 40 percent purchase of the firm off KKR in April, as well as other pick-ups so far this year including?Gillespie Advisory in Canberra?and FiveP’s Microsoft?business applications practice. The country’s sixth largest accounting and consulting network of its kind, Findex has grown from a team of around 100 to 2,500 professionals in more than 100 locations across Australia and New Zealand over the past decade with KKR’s support, including through the?purchase of Crowe’s local business. The firm said Mercury’s investment marked a pivotal step in its next chapter.

4.?????? Synechron doubles Australian presence through dual acquisitions

Global digital transformation consultancy Synechron continues its march on Australian soil, doubling its local presence on the back of dual acquisitions Chamonix IT and Exposé. The sister consultancies are based out of Adelaide, respectively focused on full service digital solutions and data science, engineering and AI, and together add around 200 professionals to Synechron’s Australian headcount. The latest acquisitions follow hot on the heels of Melbourne-based?cloud & data specialist iGreenData, completed last month, while the financial services-focused consultancy kicked off the year by?opening a new office in Sydney. Chamonix was established and is led by former Kloud Solutions (now a part of Telstra Purple) SA state director Scott Grigg in 2010, alongside Kloud co-founder Geoff Rohrsheim via his tech incubator Hatch Creations, with Exposé launched six years later together with CEO Kelly Drewett. Hatch stable-mates?include Cevo and Arinco, which now sit under Quadrant’s Connetico banner.

5.?????? Tech consulting firms CSO Group and xAmplify agree merger

Australian consultancies CSO Group and xAmplify are merging to form what the partners describe as the country’s largest home-grown and locally-owned cyber security, AI and automation firm.?To be headquartered in Sydney and pulling in combined annual revenues in excess of $100 million, the new enterprise has yet to announce what its name will be going ahead, but say that the arrangement is “a true merger of equals”. Based out of Canberra, xAmplify offers a range of services geared around AI and automation, while CSO primarily focuses on the cybersecurity market, with the latter the presumed target of the merger despite increased crowding. Simkovic established CSO in Perth in 2017 after an earlier general manager stint at ASG Group,?which is now part of NRI. xAmplify was founded one year later, with current CEO Wayne Gowland likewise having been as a general manager at ASG, bringing a background at Telstra and?Unisys. Notably, he has also been a director at CSO Group since its inception. The new entity will combine to have a headcount of 160-plus across the country serving more than 100 existing public and private sector clients, including those in the energy, financial services, health, construction, and retail sectors among others, with the shareholders of each to become equal owners according to the reported terms of the deal once it clears in the back half of the year.

6.?????? Brennan buys Adelaide’s Nuago, expands national play

Systems integrator and outsource provider, Brennan has ramped up its national footprint, snapping up Adelaide-based Nuago.?The deal is part of Brennan’s strategy to enhance its national customer delivery capabilities and has been unanimously accepted by Nuago’s board of directors, effective 1 July 2024.?The financial terms of the deal haven’t been disclosed. Since launching in Adelaide in 2016,?Nuago’s managed service solutions have empowered South Australian organisations on their digital journey.?For customers, this acquisition unlocks access to an even deeper and richer pool of skills and talent. Our expanded national footprint opens an exciting chapter and fresh opportunities. And for the wider market, our ongoing investment in Australian-owned and operated technology specialists underscores our intent and ambition to grow further.”?

7.?????? FAIR Consulting buys Brightwater

Sydney-based SAP specialist FAIR Consulting has picked up fellow specialist Brightwater Technology, and recruited former SAP veteran Pete Andrew as its new A/NZ managing director. Andrew has spent the past two decades at the German-origin ERP giant after joining from?PA Consulting?in 2005, including four and a half years as A/NZ chief operating officer and most recently as head of industries. Andrew will lead a team which now includes Brightwater Technology, which was established in Sydney in 2015 by former UXC Oxygen (now?DXC Technology) leaders and focuses on project management and SAP Basis and Netweaver services. Ebadi set up the firm close to twelve years ago, having earlier spent time at?Capgemini?in Sweden and management consultancy Lodestone locally prior to its acquisition by?Infosys?in 2012. Andrew takes over a full-service consulting business that has grown to include further outlets in Adelaide, Melbourne and Karachi, with a combined headcount pushing toward the 100-mark. An MBA-holder from Cambridge, Andrew brings serious credentials, having also served as SAP’s general manager for New South Wales in addition to A/NZ COO and regional industries lead.

8.?????? efex buys Adelaide's Aish IT to increase South Australian presence

Regional managed services provider?efex?has announced the acquisition of Adelaide-based IT support and security firm Aish IT for an undisclosed sum.?The acquisition will enable efex to use the "superior technical skills" of Aish IT’s team, particularly in network engineering, while offering Aish IT customers economies of scale and an expanded product range, effex said. This includes efex’s MS Cyber Lite solution that will launch in July 2024. efex labelled the acquisition a "strategically important move," with the firm identifying South Australia as a "vital hub due to the significant number of SMBs with increasingly complex IT requirements."? The acquisition is expected to add more than 10 percent to efex's South Australian client base and headcount. Founded in 1989, Aish IT serves over 750 small and medium business clients and is known for its expertise in networks, cloud, cyber and modern workplace products.

9.?????? Nous Group buys boutique consultancy Health Policy Analysis

Nous Group has beefed up its capabilities in the healthcare sector with the acquisition of Health Policy Analysis, a boutique Sydney-based consultancy with around a dozen staff. Expected to close at the start of next month, the acquisition will see?Nous Group?deepen its expertise in topics such as healthcare policy, evaluation, planning, modelling, analytics, classification, costing and pricing, as well as data and information management. Health Policy Analysis works with healthcare institutions and aged care clients, and has completed over 300 projects since its inception twenty-one years ago. The deal comes shortly after Nous Group was recognised as one of Australia’s?leading healthcare consultancies, with the addition of Health Policy Analysis (which also made the list, albeit somewhat lower) further cementing the firm’s market leadership.

10.?? PIC (PwC Indigenous Consulting) joins Deloitte

Deloitte Australia is proud to announce the purchase of a minority stake in the market-leading First Nations consulting business formerly known as PIC (PwC Indigenous Consulting). This milestone marks the evolution of the business after more than 10 years of successful operations, delivering impact for First Nations communities. In honour of its deep relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and communities, and its commitment to partnering to achieve outcomes, the business will be renamed?Yamagigu. The Wiradyuri word meaning “our purpose is to go with you” encapsulates the spirit of partnership and shared journey. Yamagigu Consulting will provide First Nations expertise to government, private sector and community based clients in designing and delivering policies, programs, and services to improve outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, in line with the principles of Closing the Gap. The new business will retain its majority First Nations-owned corporate and governance structures, its national reach and its core values of Truth, Respect and Self-Determination.?

11.?? Fusion5 acquires IntegrationWorks

ICT service provider Fusion5 has acquired Wellington-headquartered systems integrator (SI) IntegrationWorks to boost its presence in Australia and the UK. IntegrationWorks has seven offices across the world, with three offices in New Zealand – Auckland and Christchurch, in addition to its Wellington base. It also has three offices in Australia – Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, and one in Bath in the UK. According to Fusion5, the SI works in the public sector and enterprise space, with the service provider’s CEO,?Sven Martin, claiming the acquired company has “has significant skills, expertise and referenceability over a wide range of integration solutions and technologies”. Under the deal, 80 integration consultants will be added to Fusion5’s existing Integration and Innovation pillar, with IntegrationWorks officially becoming part of the service provider on 1 August. Fusion5’s acquisition of IntegrationWorks comes a month after it picked up another Wellington-based managed service provider?GoCloud Systems?in June.

12.?? Deloitte buys smart manufacturing business Efficientia Solutions

The Australian branch of professional services firm Deloitte has bought industrial and manufacturing sector technology integration and support specialists Efficientia Solutions. Established in 2018 and based out of Sydney, the highly-specialised firm provides services in the areas of automated software solutions, strategy, and productivity improvement to clients in the manufacturing and heavy industries. The company is led by managing director Gordon Cornish, who now joins Deloitte’s smart manufacturing practice as a principal alongside a team of seven consultants and engineers out of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. The Efficientia Solutions team share?a common history at Wonderware in Australia and South Africa, which now sits under the Aveva brand within Schneider Electric. For example, Cornish, and his Efficientia colleagues Richard Anderson and Carel de Jager – respectively now senior manager and senior OT specialist lead at Deloitte – all previously spent upwards of a decade and a half at Wonderware.

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