Thoma Bravo has accomplished its $5.3 billion acquisition of British cybersecurity group Darktrace, ending a tumultuous takeover rocked by the resignation of its CEO and the demise of early backer Mike Lynch.
The personal fairness big confirmed on Tuesday that it had agreed to purchase Darktrace, taking the corporate off the London Inventory Alternate in a take-private deal.
The closure ends a tense couple of months for Darktrace because it sought to shut a bumper deal agreed in April. The acquisition gained extra public consciousness following Lynch’s demise in August.
Lynch died alongside six different passengers when the Bayesian yacht he was on sank after operating into storms on the Mediterranean Sea. His passing left an unconcluded civil swimsuit with HPE over the $11.7 billion acquisition of Autonomy in 2011 and helped resurface questions aimed toward Darktrace.
Early in September, Darktrace co-founder and CEO Poppy Gustafsson then unexpectedly resigned from the corporate weeks earlier than the takeover would full.
Gustafsson co-founded Darktrace in 2013 after departing Lynch’s controversial Autonomy Group, the place she was a company controller. In her assertion asserting her resignation, Gustafsson stated she was wanting ahead to persevering with at Darktrace as a non-executive director.
“Darktrace has been a huge part of my life and my identity for over a decade, and I am immensely proud of everything we have achieved in that time,” Gustafsson stated in a press release.
Nevertheless, in its assertion, Darktrace stated all non-executive administrators of the corporate had tendered their resignations and stepped down from the board.
A consultant for Darktrace didn’t instantly reply to Fortune’s request for clarification as as to if this included Gustafsson.
Gustafsson was changed by COO Jill Popelka, who solely joined the cybersecurity group in January as a non-executive director. Popelka beforehand labored at Snap, Accenture, and SAP SuccessFactors.
“Protecting businesses and organisations with best-in-class AI-powered, proactive cybersecurity will remain at the absolute core of what we do,” Popelka stated in a press release. Collectively, we will take this even additional, investing in our individuals to reinforce our technical capabilities and delivering distinctive service and worth for our prospects.”
Thoma Bravo’s acquisition was considered a significant blow to the London Inventory Alternate, which has watched a number of massive corporations withdraw from the change in current months to go for rival exchanges or to go personal.
“Darktrace holds a unique position at the forefront of cybersecurity technology,” stated Seth Boro, managing associate at Thoma Bravo.
“As one of the early adopters of AI, the value of its capabilities is evident to businesses, governments and society across the world. We are excited to work alongside Jill and the Darktrace team to build on their success, supporting their ambitions to protect the world from the most advanced cyber threats.”
Mike Lynch hyperlinks
Lynch was a significant early backer of Darktrace via his enterprise capital agency Invoke Capital. He helped arrange his personal fairness fund with the reported £500 million he bagged from the HPE acquisition. Lynch put in a number of key gamers from Autonomy on the helm of Darktrace, together with his former protégé Gustafsson.
Lynch held a couple of 3% stake within the firm on the time of his passing.
Stephen Chamberlain, his co-accused in a prison trial within the U.S. in June and a former COO of Darktrace, died after being struck by a automotive whereas on a run in Cambridgeshire. He would cross away on the identical day that the Bayesian sank.
Darktrace was the goal of short-sellers final 12 months after U.S. hedge fund Quintessential Capital Administration questioned the corporate’s monetary statements.
An impartial probe by EY discovered no want for Darktrace to amend earlier monetary statements, and the matter evidently didn’t serve to place Thoma Bravo off its now-completed acquisition.
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