Lawson Software is to buy Swedish software
firm Intentia International an £264m deal.
The merged company will provide business
applications for the services, manufacturing, distribution and
maintenance sectors to 4,000 customers in 40 countries.
Richard Lawson, chairman of the Lawson
Software board, said the deal was “not a typical software
consolidation”.
He added, “This is a combination of equal
companies that has tremendous growth potential in the enterprise
software market. We are very excited about going forward as a
unified organisation with a strong financial position and strong
balance in our customers, people, products, industry markets and
geographies.”
Romesh Wadhwani, chairman of the Intentia
board, said there was little product or geographic overlap, so the
new company could retain service and support for existing products
without disruption.
“We are committed to providing new releases,
enhancements and support for our core products for at least five
years,” he said.
Lawson Software also announced that president
and chief executive, Jay Coughlan, would step down. He will be
replaced by Harry Debes, president and chief executive of SPL
Worldgroup.
The all-stock deal, unanimously approved by
the boards of directors of both companies, is expected to close by
31 December, when Bertrand Sciard, president and chief executive of
Intentia, will become chief operating officer of the combined
company.