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An Australian cyber security firm is exploring the possibility of being absorbed by an international rival for $176 million.
Sky News Business Reporter Edward Boyd says the ASX 200 finished the day up on Tuesday.
On Tuesday, Melbourne-based Tesserent revealed in an ASX announcement that it was being courted in a takeover deal with French tech outfit Thales.
The deal is still subject to regulatory and investor approval, but in the announcement, Tesserent encouraged shareholders to vote favourably on the “compelling proposal”.
Thales is offering to pay $0.13 per share, of which Tesserent has 1.3 billion shares.
Tesserent said the deal inflated their value by 165.3 per cent, as they had closed on June 9 trading at 0.049 per share.
But off the back of the news, Tesserent has surged on the stock market, spiking by 150 per cent.
At close of market on Tuesday, the tech firm was trading at 0.12 per share.
The company’s share price spiked once the news broke.
As part of the takeover, Tesserent would maintain its name and operations, except that its logo would include a tagline that states “cyber solutions by Thales”.
Tesserent provides cybersecurity services to more than 1200 government and corporate clients. With several hundred employees, based in Box Hill in Melbourne, it’s been listed on the ASX for the past seven years.
With a market capitalisation of $162 million on the ASX, Tesserent is projecting total revenue of $200 million in revenue for the current financial year ending later this month.
Tesserent’s board unanimously recommends that they pursue the deal.
Were the merger to go ahead, Thales is hopeful they would have a dominant foothold across Australia and New Zealand.
Thales, headquartered in France, works in a similar space to Tesserent in the cyber security industry.
The French firm has 77,000 employees in 68 countries.
Last year, Thales made $28 billion from sales.
Thales said it had $5 billion of cash at bank, meaning the acquisition would be fully funded internally.
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