Vista Equity Partners to acquire Misys for £1.27 bn

British banking software services firm Misys today agreed to be acquired by Vista Equity Partners for £1.27 billion ($2 billion), after its Swiss rival Temenos backed out from merger talks.

San Francisco-based Vista will pay 350 pence-per-share in cash and merge Misys with Kondor, the trade and risk management software firm, which Vista had last year acquired from Thomson Reuters.

Geneva-based Temenos first ignited the takeover battle on 3 February, when it started talks with Misys on a £2-billion all-stock merger in order to create the largest vendor of banking software (See: British banking software firm Misys in merger talks with Swiss rival Temenos).

The deal had the backing of Misys largest shareholder, US-based ValueAct Capital, which holds 21.5 per cent stake

On 20 February, Vista made a rival £1.2-billion offer for Misys, torpedoing an agreed all-share merger between competing rivals Misys and Temenos.(See: Vista Equity Partners to scupper Temenos-Misys merger with £1.2bn offer).

Early this month, ValueAct suddenly changed tracks and teamed up with CVC Capital Partners to reveal that they were in talks about launching a cash bid. The size of CVC-ValueAct potential bid is still to be tabled.