SAP and Sybase, Inc. have announced that SAP's subsidiary, SAP America, Inc., has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire Sybase, in a transaction that will bring them together to enable companies to become better-run "unwired enterprises." The planned transaction is expected to close in July 2010, and, according to the companies, Sybase, based in Dublin, Calif., will be run as a standalone company under the name "Sybase an SAP company."
Under the terms and conditions of the merger agreement, SAP America, Inc., will make an all cash tender offer for all of the outstanding shares of Sybase common stock at $65.00 per share, representing an enterprise value of approximately $5.8 billion.
"This is a strategic moment for SAP, for Sybase, our customers, and the IT industry," said Bill McDermott, co-CEO of SAP and a member of the SAP executive board, in a conference call for analyst and the press. "This transaction is fully aligned with our strategic objectives to significantly expand our addressable market, opening up new opportunities in mobility, in-memory computing, and analytics."
"We always said that we would use M&D to move ourselves strategically forward and not just buy market share, and this acquisition does exactly that. The acquisition of Sybase falls right in line with our three-pillar strategy," observed Jim Hagemann Snabe, co-CEO of SAP and member of the SAP executive board, during the conference call. "We are already the market leader in on-premise software with SAP Business Suite, we are extending into on-demand software with SAP Business ByDesign and on-demand extensions for large enterprises, and now, with the acquisition of Sybase, we will be number-one in on-device," Snabe said.
John Chen, CEO of Sybase, also joined the SAP executives on the call announcing the acquisition. "The SAP in-memory technology in combination with the SAP Business Objects technology as well as the Sybase column-based architecture will revolutionize how transaction and analytics applications are built in the future," said Chen. "Further, by combining the market leaders in enterprise applications with the market leadership in enterprise mobility, companies and our customers around the world will be able to run their business from any device any time. This will drive obviously a new wave of enterprise productivity."
The Sybase board of directors has unanimously approved the transaction. The closing of the tender offer is conditioned on the tender of a majority of the outstanding shares of Sybase's common stock on a fully diluted basis and clearance by the relevant antitrust authorities.
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For more about Sybase, go here.