BC and GIC close to Acuris sale to Ion

Kenny Wastell
10 May 2019

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BC Partners and Singaporean sovereign wealth fund GIC are to sell Acuris, the parent company of Unquote, to trade buyer and Ireland-based financial technology business Ion Group, according to media reports.

Unquote has also unearthed publicly available documents related to companies named Acuris International, Acuris Holdings and Acuris Bidco, incorporated in April 2019 and registered at Ion's London office.

However, one source close to the situation told Unquote that no sale had been formalised to date and that the process remained ongoing.

Citing "city sources", the Telegraph reports that the potential transaction could value Acuris at up to £1.2bn, while a report in the Financial Times cited "people close to the talks" who said it would value the group at "just over £1bn". Acuris generated EBITDA of £75m in 2018.

The development comes 22 months after BC sold a 30% stake in Acuris to GIC, following which BC retained a stake of more than 60% in the business.

Should it be confirmed, the deal would bring to an end a sale process that was formally launched in January 2019, according to an earlier report by Bloomberg, while Reuters reported in November 2018 that the launch of an auction process was expected in early 2019.

Ion is a financial software and data business comprised of three divisions: Ion Markets, Ion Treasury and Ion Commodities. The business owns a majority stake in capital market data provider Dealogic.

A number of trade buyers and financial sponsors are reported to have been involved in the bidding process for Acuris. The Financial Times reported in March that News Corp and Axel Springer have entered the bidding for the company. Other potential buyers to have reportedly expressed an interest or prepared bids include S&P Global, Moody's and Fitch, in addition to private equity houses including Advent International, EQT Partners, Hellman & Friedman and KKR.

Acuris has made a number of bolt-ons since it first received backing from BC. The group bought Perfect Information and The Law Report Group in 2014, Unquote, AVCJ and C6 Intelligence in 2015, Creditflux in 2016, TIM Group in 2017, SparkSpread in 2018 and Blackpeak in March 2019.

Acuris, which rebranded from Mergermarket Group in July 2017, has also invested in product development and its IT infrastructure.