Schneider Electric SE has reached an agreement to take control of UK software maker Aveva Group PLC in a combination coming just over a year after the last round of talks between the companies failed.
The transaction would effectively be a reverse takeover of Aveva, which will issue shares to Schneider that will give the French company a 60 percent stake in the Cambridge, England-based business, according to a joint statement yesterday.
Schneider will pay ￡550 million (US$711 million) in cash, distributed to shareholders of Aveva, who will also get another ￡100 million for a total of about ￡1.14 a share.
Aveva stock traded at ￡1.92 at the close in London on Monday, valuing the company at ￡1.2 billion. The company will continue to be listed on the London stock exchange.
The proposed combination would mark the third time that Schneider has attempted a deal with Aveva.
Schneider’s second overture ended in June last year, just two days after talks became public. The original dialogue broke down amid concerns about the size of integration costs and complexity of untangling a business.
The deal would bring together two industrial software units, creating a business that would help design and operate engineering projects from nuclear power plants to diesel engines.
Along with chipmakers CSR PLC and ARM Holdings PLC, Aveva is one of Britain’s digital-age success stories with origins in Cambridge, home of the university that produced scientists such as Charles Darwin.
Aveva, which was developed in a government-funded computer center in 1967, introduced the world’s first 3D plant-design system in 1976.
With Aveva, Schneider would add to its footprint in the UK, where the French company has sought to adapt to a slackening construction and infrastructure market amid the country’s planned retreat from the EU.
Schneider in February said that it would review the headcount in the country.
The deal would be the second in short order for Schneider, which in July agreed to buy US power-systems maker ASCO Power Technologies for US$1.25 billion.
Schneider, the world’s biggest maker of low-and-medium-voltage equipment, has been trying to offset falling sales at its infrastructure division.
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