Dusseldorf Imagine: You belong to a large financial investor that already holds two-fifths of the shares in a software company and has two seats on the supervisory board. Then you decide to buy the company entirely and sit down at the negotiating table with the seller. But suddenly other bidders join them and announce that they want to outbid your offer.
This is the beginning of the bidding war between the investors Silver Lake and Bain Capital for the Darmstadt-based company Software AG. At least, that’s how Silver Lake would tell the story, putting himself in the role of the person who sat at the negotiating table beforehand and was then caught off guard.
But if you ask Bain Capital how it all started, you’ll hear a different story. And that is also characteristic of a bidding war: the opponents are not only arguing about the object, but also about the truth.
And so Software AG, founded in 1969, finds itself in the middle of a bidding war between two American investors. “The whole thing is an unusual process,” says corporate finance correspondent Arno Schütze.
For investors, the dispute over the sale has so far paid off. In the past few weeks, the share price has risen by more than 50 percent. In this episode of Handelsblatt Deals you can find out what is behind the developments, how things are going to continue and who would really benefit from a deal in the end.
If you have any comments, questions, criticism or praise for this episode, please feel free to email us: [email protected]
Exclusive offer for Handelsblatt Deals listeners: Test Handelsblatt Premium for 4 weeks for €1 and stay informed about what’s happening in the business world. More information: handelsblatt.com/mehrfusionen.
Help us to keep improving our podcasts. Your opinion is important to us: www.handelsblatt.com/satisfaction