The French branch of investment bank Apax Partners & Co has been given the go-ahead by the government’s Consortium de Realisation (CDR) to acquire control of software and services company CCMX, one of the assets of the insolvent bank Credit Lyonnais which the state is selling off.
Apax bid 152m euros ($165m) for CCMX, thereby beating Lyon-based French IT services company Cegid SA by about 20%. The acquisition was originally announced last December, but was challenged by Cegid and other potential buyers.
CCMX, which is located just outside Paris, specializes in products for putting small and medium-sized companies, as well as small accounting firms, online, an activity from which it derived revenues of FF792m ($131m) and an operating profit of FF56m ($9.31m) last year.
Apax will control 68% of CCMX, followed by the Compagnie Financiere et Industrielle Gaz et Eaux (part of the Lazard group), with 29%, and members of CCMXÆs existing board of directors, with the remaining 3%.
