In a bid to keep up with competitors and to allow customers to enhance inter-enterprise supply chain collaboration, CDC Software today said it plans to acquire WKD Solutions Ltd., the Surrey, U.K.-based maker of business activity monitoring (BAM) and event management software sold under the Categoric brand.
Financial terms of the cash deal, which still must be approved by CDC Software’s board of directors, were not disclosed. CDC Software, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hong Kong-based CDC Corp., expects the deal to be finalized in 60 to 90 days, said David Cahn, vice president of product strategy in an interview with Managing Automation.
The deal follows an OEM arrangement that has been in place between CDC Software and WKD for the past three years. CDC Software has been selling WKD’s BAM and event management software as part of CDC’s Collaboration Support Framework, which helps manufacturers using CDC ’s supply chain warehouse management, transportation management, and demand management tools integrate and collaborate with supply chain partners. WKD’s Categoric tools, for example, can be used to automatically alert supply chain partners when goods are received or rejected, when stock dips below a prescribed level, or when goods are selling more quickly or slowly than projected.
CDC Software decided to buy privately owned WKD because such collaboration is becoming more important to customers, Cahn said, and because CDC Software has seen competitors in the supply chain management software market make similar deals to acquire BAM and event management software technologies. CDC competitor Red Prairie, for example, in 2006 bought Danish software vendor Alta A/S, which focuses on supply chain collaboration in the automotive industry.