French industrial conglomerate pays $10.75b, but already owned lion’s share of industrial software specialist
Analysis Yet another major UK technology business is to pass into foreign ownership with Schneider Electric’s £9.48 billion (c $10.75 billion) deal to acquire all the outstanding shares in Aveva.
The French industrial conglomerate already owned about 60 percent of the Brit industrial and engineering software outfit, but the two have now entered into an agreement on a formal offer that will allow Schneider to purchase the remainder of the outstanding shares in the company.
According to Schneider, the move will allow it to take a „holistic approach to digitization“ across a customer’s operations and deliver improvements such as a reduction in energy, carbon and resource intensity that will help customers to move towards greater efficiency and sustainability.
For its part, Aveva claimed that companies are increasingly turning to industrial software to find greater efficiency and sustainability, and „the full combination with Schneider Electric is intended to enable Aveva to execute its strategy faster, and further enhance its customer proposition.“
Schneider became the largest shareholder in Aveva in 2018, when the UK company agreed to merge with Schneider’s own industrial software business. The shares are actually held by Samos Acquisition Company, an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Schneider, and the agreement will see these and the remaining outstanding shares acquired by Ascot Acquisition Holdings Limited, another indirect subsidiary of Schneider.
