BMC Software Inc. (NYSE: BMC) today announced that it has offered to acquire Identify Software Ltd., a provider of application problem resolution (APR) software. Under the terms of the acquisition agreement, BMC will pay approximately $150 million in cash for the shares.
Founded by former Mercury Interactive Corp. (Pink Sheets:MERQE) employees in 1996, Identify Software develops optimization solutions for support processes in enterprise applications.
Negotiations between Identify and BMC were first reported in October of last year. At that time, "Globes" reported Identify had been negotiating an acquisition with several major international companies, including BMC Software, and that the two had also been mulling possible cooperative ventures.
In February 2004, BMC expressed interest in investing in Identify but the funding round was already closed. The $15 million round was co-led by the venture capital funds of Star Ventures and Evergreen Partners, with participation by existing investors Earlybird, Formula Ventures, Infinity Funds, Intel, Mofet, NIF Ventures, UBS, and Vertex Venture Capital.
A year later, Plenus Venture Lending Fund extended Identify a $5 million credit line, for the second time. Plenus gave the company a similar credit line in 2002.
BMC president and CEO Bob Beauchamp said today, "The acquisition of Identify's state-of-the-art application problem resolution technology will further extend BMC's leadership in transaction management and will continue to clearly differentiate BMC's business service management (BSM) strategy."
Identify president and CEO Yochi Slonim said, "BMC is the clear leader in BSM, which is entering the IT mainstream. Identify's application lifecycle management solution, coupled with BMC's existing transaction management solution, will strengthen the company's BSM portfolio and broaden its value proposition into new markets and customers. This will be a very synergistic combination, and Identify is proud to be part of it."
In a March 2006 Forrester report entitled, "BMC Acquires Identify", analyst JP Garbani wrote, "The Identify solution reinforces BMC's capability in J2EE and .NET environments and directly supports BMC Business Service Management strategy by providing visibility into the execution of an application that supports a business service.
"Identify's application problem resolution capabilities is a strong complement to BMC's BSM capabilities to look into application performance and map the infrastructure supporting the application delivery."
Founded in 1980, BMC Software is a leading provider of enterprise management solutions. BMC has offices worldwide and fiscal 2005 revenues of more than $1.46 billion. BMC stated that it expects the Identify transaction to close during the first quarter of 2007.
Investment bank Thomas Weisel Partners, represented in Israel by Magnolia Capital Partners, acted as exclusive advisor to Identify.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on March 27, 2006
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