In June, German software company SAP made a bid for the American software company BlackLine, which specializes in financial automation. The offer, worth nearly $4.5 billion ($66 per share), was rebuffed. SAP is now considering making a new bid for BlackLine.
Reuters reports this based on a letter and a source. SAP, which is collaborating with investment bank JPMorgan in the takeover attempt, offered 31 percent more on June 18 than BlackLine’s average share price over the past two months. In the letter reviewed by Reuters, SAP emphasized that outside financing was not necessary for the acquisition. However, Los Angeles based BlackLine rejected the offer without further negotiations.
SAP and BlackLine have been collaborating for years. SAP sells BlackLine’s solutions to its customers, which accounts for nearly 30 percent of BlackLine’s annual revenue.
In the offer letter, SAP’s Chief Financial Officer Dominik Asam and Chief Corporate Development and Investment Officer Georg Kniese call the acquisition a “logical extension of the long standing partnership.” The offer came at a time when BlackLine co-CEO and founder Theresa Tucker was handing over her reins to Owen Ryan, who also serves as chairman.
BlackLine provides cloud software that helps companies automate and streamline complex financial processes, such as cleaning financial records before migrating it to new platforms.
An acquisition would strengthen SAP’s position in cloud-based financial software, competing with companies like Oracle and Workday.
SAP faces challenges migrating customer data to its newer HANA cloud platform. The integration of BlackLine could accelerate this process.
