Bolstered in part by a cash infusion from its recent initial public offering, CDC Software is acquiring its way to what it hopes will be a broader footprint in the manufacturing market, announcing today that it has purchased Activplant, a manufacturing intelligence software specialist, for an undisclosed sum.
The acquisition of Activplant, best known for its Throughput Analyzer technology, will support the build-out of the CDC Factory software for manufacturing operations management. Activplant’s MI software helps companies identify the bottlenecks slowing their production processes and redress such inefficiencies. CDC touted Activplant’s penetration of the automotive, CPG, food and beverage, and forest products markets as key drivers of today’s deal.
In a statement, CDC Software President Bruce Cameron called Activplant “an ideal fit with our CDC Factory product line” and fuel for CDC’s push toward a leadership position in packaged manufacturing operations management software. “It also expands CDC Factory’s already significant presence in the food and beverage and CPG markets,” he said, “as well as help[s] CDC Supply Chain solutions penetrate further in the Tier 1 automotive industry.”
The buyout follows CDC’s May announcement that it would acquire Informance, another MI software company. That deal remains unfinished, a CDC spokeswoman said today, citing ongoing due diligence work by CDC. Should that deal proceed, she said, there would be no technology overlap between Informance and Activplant. “Most importantly,” she told Managing Automation in an e-mail exchange, “Activplant really helps us penetrate the automotive market more with our other solutions, such as CDC Supply Chain, which already has automotive customers.”
CDC Software also bought two unnamed SaaS software companies in the past month, part of what it called a “roll-up strategy” to capitalize on the on-demand software phenomenon.
In the lead-up to CDC Software’s August IPO, CEO Peter Yip foreshadowed the buying binge, saying, “We … believe that the IPO helps to provide CDC Software with its own currency to help strengthen its acquisition strategy so it can continue to build out its enterprise applications and services platform, and enables the company to expand into other vertical and high-growth emerging markets, such as in India and China.”
For now, the fate of Activplant’s employees remains unclear. “We are currently evaluating headcount and some employees and executives will stay on,” the CDC spokeswoman said. “But specifics have not been determined yet.” Activplant maintains a staff of approximately 40 people.