On this photograph illustration a DarkTrace emblem is displayed on a smartphone with inventory market percentages within the background.
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LONDON — British cybersecurity agency Darktrace on Friday introduced it had agreed a sale to U.S. non-public fairness large Thoma Bravo, for an all-cash supply of $5.315 million.
Darktrace shares have been 17% greater at 10:26 a.m. London time.
Traders are set to obtain $7.75 in money for every share held, underneath the phrases advisable by the board.
Its transfer non-public can be seen as a serious blow to the London Inventory Change, the place it listed in 2021. The corporate was seen as a welcome dynamic addition to a market usually characterised as much less interesting to expertise companies than these within the U.S. or Asia, and stacked with “outdated economic system” gamers, comparable to miners and oil and gasoline firms.
Darktrace particularly referenced its perception that it’s undervalued within the U.Ok. as a purpose for the sale. In a press release, it mentioned its board believes the agency’s operational and monetary “achievements” usually are not mirrored in its valuation and that shares are buying and selling “at a big low cost to its world peer group.”
Darktrace was based in 2013 and relies within the U.Ok. metropolis of Cambridge, which has attracted a cluster of tech companies during the last decade. It makes a speciality of synthetic intelligence-based safety in opposition to cloud assaults for giant firms and occasions, and has roughly 2,300 workers primarily based worldwide.
Thoma Bravo mentioned the acquisiton would improve its publicity to the big and rising cybersecurity market, and that its funding in Darktrace would assist scale the enterprise globally.
The deal represents a 44.3% premium to the common volume-weighted Darktrace share value within the three months to April 25, in keeping with the discharge.
Darktrace on Friday mentioned it had rejected earlier unsolicited proposed affords from Thoma Bravo as a result of the tech firm assessed they didn’t pretty worth the enterprise.
The corporate has confronted a number of challenges since its itemizing, together with a short-selling assault in 2023, which led it to defend its accounting practices. It has additionally sought to distance itself from co-founding investor Mike Lynch, who faces fraud expenses within the U.S.
Darktrace share value.