Warburg Pincus to Acquire German Software Firm PSI for Over €700 Million

(Reuters) -Private equity firm Warburg Pincus plans to buy German software firm PSI Software for more than 700 million euros ($813.26 million), the companies said on Monday. Reuters first reported on both a nearing takeover of PSI on Friday and Warburg Pincus’ offer for the software company on Sunday. PSI’s software helps run power and gas transmission grids as well as factories. It is recovering from a cyberattack last year and on Friday it confirmed that it was in talks to sell itself following the Reuters report. Its stock jumped nearly 11% on Friday after the news broke and closed at 33.2 euros a share. Warburg Pincus’ deal will value PSI at 45 euros a share, a premium of about 50% from the software company’s closing price on Thursday. PSI said its board supports Warburg Pincus’ offer and intends to recommend it to its shareholders. PSI plans to delist from the German stock exchange after the closing of the deal. PSI added that Warburg Pincus would maintain the company’s management structure and its headquarters in Berlin. Warburg Pincus has signed agreements for about 28.5% of PSI’s equity with its anchor shareholders, PSI said. The statement said that an unnamed anchor shareholder will partially reinvest its proceeds alongside Warburg Pincus into PSI’s holding structure. German businessman and newsletter publisher Norman Rentrop is PSI’s largest shareholder with a 23% stake, while German utility E.ON is its second-largest investor with around 18%. E.ON will retain its stake in PSI and continue to support PSI as a strategic investor, Warburg and PSI said. Last year, PSI posted a loss before interest and taxes of 15.2 million euros ($17.62 million) as it was hobbled for weeks by the cyberattack. Goldman Sachs is running the sale process. ($1 = 0.8607 euros) (Reporting by Rishabh Jaiswal, Shubham Kalia and Disha Mishra in Bengaluru and Alexander Huebner and Christoph Steitz in Munich; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips and Thomas Derpinghaus) (The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)