S&P downgrades Netherlands to AA+

Just couple of days after world's largest credit rating agency announced its fascination towards another Indian, Netherlands' credit rating was downgraded.  Company has announced to degrade country to AA+ band after a continuation of slowdown in the country.

Couple of days before S&P has announced its new boss, Indian origin Neeraj Sahai.  Last time Indian origin Devan Sharma made news when he downgraded USA.  Unfortunately only three weeks after the decision he left S&P.  Although company gave justification regarding the designation, truth may be something else far from the covered area.

As per S&P Netherlands' growth forecast and prospects are weaker than anticipated by agency prior.  Moreover GDP per capita growth is also lower than its peers of the same group.  Post this downgrade only Germany, Luxembourg and Finland are the only one with Gold class ratings.  Out of 17 member Euro Zone,  this number looks quite detrimental for future of the block. 

In a separate announcement agency has also raised the outlook for Spain's debt to Stable from negative.  This was the effect of economic growth in the country being gradually resumed.

The important aspect is to see Mr. Sahai's fortune in S&P in the light of these all consequences along with the lawsuit company is facing from US Dept of Justice.    

iVantage Health Analytics acquires Xylem Consulting, LLC

Portland based leading health analytics solution provider, iVantage Health Analytics has announced the acquisition of Columbia based strategic consulting provider, Xylem Consulting, LLC. The terms and conditions of deal are not disclosed.

Xylum consulting was founded in 2007 by Jack Wolf, CPA, MHA.  Company provides data driven strategic decision support system to large hospitals across the state.  Company has a large clientèle list with academic medical centres, community hospitals and so in the list.  Firm has build an excellent track record in getting contractual goals for hospitals completed.  Company also supports on various health care services and pricing strategies.  

iVantage Health Analytics is a provider of healthcare informatics and business analytic solutions.  These solutions transform complex data into actionable business intelligence.  Its platform namely, VantagePoints is also used by hospitals to derive at decision making.  Company's platform has a unique approach of connecting executive dashboards, hospital and system level market analytics, GIS mapping, clinical benchmarking, physician scorecard and so.

This acquisition will complement iVantage's recent acquisition of Professional Data Services (PDS).  Moreover the most important task of this acquisition will to increasing the ever eroding margins related to healthcare sector.  This acquisition will support hospitals increase their bottom line.   

Carlyle to buy Diversified Global Asset Management Corporation

After the acquisition of Edgewood Partners Insurance Centre (EPIC), The Carlyle group has moved ahead for another acquisition.  Now the target is Diversified Global Asset Management Corporation, an employee owned hedge fund sponsor.

Diversified Global Asset Management Corporation is based in Canada and was founded in 2004.  Company provides its services to pooled investment vehicles and invests in alternative investments across the globe.  As of now company has more than $6.7 billion in managed and advised assets.  

The Carlyle group is global alternate asset management fund with $185 billion of Asset Under Management spread across 122 funds and 81 fund of funds.  Company offices are spread over six continents employing 1450 persons in 34 offices. Carlyle's major investors are public pension funds.

This acquisition is expected to close by February 2014 and was advised by Goldman, Sachs & Co.  Equity for the transaction will come from Carlyle's balance sheet.  This transaction is also termed as an effort by Carlyle Group to come out of Private Equity umbrella.  Despite hedge fund's return falling, Diversified Global Asset Management Corporation was able to double its assets base during past three years.  Although prior to this transaction Carlyle had presence in few hedge funds but had no presence in business of investing in group hedge funds.   

Related article: Edgewood got PE backing: EPIC acquisition by carlyle

Perficient Acquires CoreMatrix

Perficient Inc., an IT consulting firm based at St. Louis, Missouri, has acquired CoreMatrix, a cloud computing based consulting firm.

CoreMatrix is a provider of cloud computing consulting and social strategy development firm.  Company has experience of over 1800 cloud computing engagements serving mid sized to Fortune 500 companies.  Company was established in 2002 and is a sales-force gold alliance partner.  

Perficient is a technology consulting firm serving customers in North America.  Perficient helps its clients use internet based technologies to improve productivity and competitiveness along with increased customer engagement and strong relationships with suppliers and partners.  

Perficient's current revenue are approaching $400 million and CoreMatrix is a $15 million annual revenue consulting firm.  Earlier this year Perficient acquired Clear Task, another sales form focused firm.  Clear Task major focus was towards west coast while Core Matrix major source of revenue is from east coast.  This complements the prior acquisition.

Company is betting on the recent trend of decreasing operating costs by using cloud based servers.  This engagement also increases customer satisfaction and reduce operating costs.   

BOKU Inc acquired Qubecell, India based direct carrier billing provider

BOKU Inc. has announced the acquisition of Mumbai based direct carrier billing provider, Qubecell, for unknown terms and conditions. 

Qubecell is India's first mobile billing aggregator.  Qubecell is integrated with all leading mobile operators of the country and were also expanding their reach in International markets especially emerging economies where bank and credit card reach is low.  Qubecell helps brands or developers to monetise via mobile payment system.  Company was till now expanding through phase of high mobile connectivity increase and android and smart phone boom in the country.  

Boku Inc is an California based company founded in 2009.  Company provides mobile payment platform enabling consumers to pay via their mobile phones.  During past four years company has got clients such as Facebook, EA, Disney and Zynga. 

With this acquisition Boku is expected to reach about 75% of country's mobile subscribers, which comes around 550 million.  As Qubecell enables billing over web, WAP, SMS and in-app; this acquisition will increase the foot hold of Boku Inc in direct carrier billing apart from direct consumer payment systems.

Green Dot gets regulator nod to acquire Wal-Mart money card from GE

Green Dot corporation has got Federal Reserve Board's approval to acquire Wal-Mart branded prepaid debit card issued by GE Capital.  This initial announcement of the deal was done in June 2013, but Green Dot has been able to convince the regulators only 5 months later the same.

Green Dot Corporation is an issuer of prepaid master card and visa cards in United States.  Company was founded in 1999 and currently hosts its card through 60,000 retail stores.  Green Dot also transfers Social Security payment to personal bank accounts.  Company is head quartered in California and provides co branded card program with Wal-Mart, AT&T, Citi Bank and so.

Green Dot announced that it will be buying Wal-Mart money card portfolio from GE capital retail bank.  Post announcement of regulatory approval, shares of Green Dot rose by 7.1% in afternoon trading by $1.66 to reach $25.  This acquisition will double Green Dot's total deposits out of which $476 million are added through this deal.  

After this deal,  Green Dot is planning to expand its services for Wal-Mart line of cards like automated bill payment system.  Company will also be offering certain services to Prepaid Master card holders like reloading card at Wal-Mart's cash registers.  Apart from this company will also be adding few more prepaid cards in same category.

Vodafone to launch NFC powered mobile wallet across Europe

Vodafone plc, a British multinational telecommunication company, with headquarters in London, has announced to launch NFC based mobile wallet service in partnership with Wirecard AG, Germany based financial services and technology company.  Company will launch the flagship service in Spain in November 2013 and Germany will follow in mid December, The UK and The Netherlands will follow thereafter somewhere during Spring of 2014.

To enable this technology, Vodafone has used its mobile wallet app Smartpass. Vodafone customers with NFC enabled sim card will make contact-less payment at the PoS (Point of Sale).  The payment wil be processed through Vodafone Smartpass credit balance.  Wirecard will provide NFC tags for mobile phone which lack NFC technology.  This NFC tag along with Smartpass app will enable customers to do the payment as described.  This technology will enable customers to send payment instructions from their mobile phone regardless of the bank they use.  

This service will be able to process payment at any Visa payment terminal.  Vodafone is also in talks with many European banks to add this technology in their portfolio.  Moreover company also plans to launch travel cards, gift cards, loyalty cards and vouchers apart from the core payment processing technology.

Towers Watson Acquires Liazon for $215mm - Supporting bright future of Private Exchanges

Tower Watson has announced to buy Liazon Corporation in a deal worth $215 million.  This deal reconfirms market trend towards the bright future of private health exchanges. 

Liazon corporation was founded in 2007.  Through Bright Choices Exchange, it provides an online benefit store.  Company argues to save lot of money from both employee and employer front, through its flagship product.  The product has capability to set predictable budget and also allows employee to personalize the package with different types of insurance coverage.  On sales side Liazon has a strong hold on broker relationship throughout the country. 

Towers Watson & Co. is a global professional services firm based at New-York.  Through its major lines of business are risk management and human resource consulting, it also supports actuarial and investment consulting practices.  When firm was formed after acquisition of Towers Perrin and Watson Wyatt Worldwide,  it was world's largest employee benefit consulting firm by revenue.  

Acquisition of Liazon Corporation is a move towards increasing the depth of products that Liazon has in its portfolio.  Prior to this, Towers Watson has also acquired Extend Health in June 2012.  Both of these acquisitions will add the strength of One Exchange Solution, the private exchange market of company.  Also Towers will also get access to a huge distribution network of over 400 brokers including largest insurance brokers.  On financial statement front, this acquisition will have a dilutive effect on adjusted EPS of about $0.10 to $0.15 in fiscal 2014.   

Financial force acquires Less Software and Vana Workforce - Horizontal broadening of salesforce CRM

FinancialForce.com, company which builds business applications for salesforce.com, has announced that it has acquired Less Software and vana workforce in two separate deals.  Terms and conditions of both the deals are yet not disclosed.

Financialforce.com was founded in 2009 with investment from UNIT4 and salesforce.com.  It has been built on salesforce.com’s technology platform force.com.  Company is headquartered in San Francisco, California and supplies accounting, billing, professional service automation and service resource planning applications.  Major product Financialforce accounting is cloud financial management software for salesforce.com.  It is core to CRM support of salesforce.com.  Company’s other product offerings are also cloud based. 

Less software provides SaaS based delivery model for supply chain management solutions.  Acquisition of less software, gives financialforce.com SCM capabilities.  This will include Configure-Price-Quote (CPQ), Order Fulfillment, Service Contracts, Inventory Management, Supplier and Spend Management.  All of these products will be bundled under a suite named Financialforce SCM.  This will be in collaboration with existing suite of products of financialforce.com for financial products. 

This whole bundle will ensure that trading partners’ supply chain activity is running flawlessly and all margins and other financial activities can be shown in financial reports.  The application is ideal for companies with multi-element revenue models.

Financial force has simultaneously announced the acquisition of vana workforce.  Vana Workforce, founded in 2008, is a cloud HR company providing human capital softwares and service solutions built for global workforce.  It is also built on same platform, force.com.  It provides one complete comprehensive human capital management solution to global organizations.  Now Vana Workforce has to be re-branded as FinancialForce Human Capital Management (HCM).  Vana’s platform is easily extensible and customizable.

Now customers using salesforce CRM, can take advantage of cross-departmental analysis and analytics from supply chain solutions to financial engagements to human resource planner.  As per se, financialforce.com is revolutionizing the back office.

Paysafecard enters Australian market

European leading online prepaid card payment provider, Paysafecard, has announced its entry in Australian market.  Predominantly used for online purchases, Paysafecard, provide access to Australians to a unique payment gateway without sharing their bank account information via internet bytes.

Paysafecard is a Vienna, Austria based company which was founded in 2000.  Today paysafecard is available both via e-vouchers and hard vouchers.  In 2009 paysafeguard was one of few companies which received European Union funding to expand in international markets.

Australia is a country where 90% of population uses internet, and e-commerce websites are very common to browse.  With a huge chunk of online buyers, this decision seems to be a strategic long term investment for the company.  Michael Mueller, CEO of Paysafecard , also confirms the same.  Another advantage for users of Paysafecard  is the low transaction fees that they need to pay.  It generally is on higher side for credit and debit card transactions.

Company has partnered with epay and Touch Networks, to increase its seller's force.  With these two on-board companies in collaboration, Paysafecard has approximately 12000 outlets' distribution network.

Lloyds to sell Asset Management arm for $1.06 billion

Following its series of acquisitions, Aberdeen Asset Management PLC has agreed to buy, Scottish Widows Investment partnership, asset Management arm of Lloyds Bank.  The deal will be a combination of cash and stock worth of 660 million pounds of US$1.06 billion.

Lloyds will initially receive 9.9% stake in Aberdeen Asset Management PLC. With reference to closing price of Friday November 15, 2013 of £426.80, this comes out to £560 million.  Moreover Lloyds can abandon this sale if Aberdeen stock's price drops below £320.  The rest of £100 million will be paid over a period of 5 years based upon the growth of business generated by two firms. 

Scottish widows investment partnership (SWIP) was acquired by Lloyds group in 2000 for £7 billion.  The acquisition was aimed at increasing the offerings of life insurance and asset management products.  But post-lehman effects have caused Lloyds to move forward to sell SWIP in 2009.  But same didn't materialize, with Lloyds receiving government bail-out package.  Government has sold its stake worth £3.2 billion, prior in this year.

Aberdeen Asset Management is a Scotland based assent management company with majority of operations and revenue from UK.  It was established in 1983 and has gone through organic growth strategy from past few years.  Aberdeen has £200.4 billion in Asset under Management as of September 30, 2013. In addition, this deal is expected to add £136 billion in the same and £234 million in annualized revenue.  This partnership is expected add to the scale across many asset classes' investment for Aberdeen Asset Management. 

Lloyd is expected to gain about £190 million gain from this acquisition. This deal expected to complete by Q1 2014.

Coin to replace all Credit Cards

A San Francisco based start-up is aiming to rule you pocket by replacing all other credit cards.  No, it is not a replacement of your existing credit or debit cards, but rather an add-on for them.  

Coin is developing a credit card sized device, that stores information of up-to eight credit, debit, gift or membership card.  To define payment by a particular card, you need to tap the circular button on the surface.  This device can  be swiped as a general credit or debit card. 

Company has applied for the patent of its technology.  This technology let the device synchronize with your android or apple smart-phone via Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE).  Using this card information is shared.  Moreover, mobile phone remains in continuous sync with this device.  So if you leave it at a pub, your phone will remind you after a certain distance.  Moreover, on similar lines, this technology can be used to lock the card if distance is high.  It is aimed to reduce the theft danger and reduce the security concerns.

But security concerns are still persistent.  Loading all your credit cards information and data on a single device, that too shared via blue-tooth can be a issue concerning many users.  Although company is still at development stage and security concerns and the way it tackles these concern will definitely define the company's future.

One year before, another start-up, icache - was supposed to provide a product on similar lines.  Although company launched its product also ,but it didn't worked fine and legal suites were enough to play the spil-sporter.

Another issue with coin's technology is that it works on magnetic strip based cards.  But now banks all over the U.S. are planning to move to chip based cards.  This will not work on as-of-now technology of Coin Inc.

Coin is funded by Y Combinator, K9 ventures and a group of individual investors. It also hopes to raise approximately $50,000 through crowd funding.  

We hope coin doesn't move icache's way.  Lets hope technology wins and prevails!!! 

Sopra Expanding Wings in German market

Sopra Banking Software, a wholly owned subsidiary of France based IT multinational, Sopra group has announced to buy 100% stake of COR&FJA Banking Solutions  GmbH.

The COR&FGA AG is a German based consultancy companies for Banking and Financial Services companies and Company pension scheme provider.  Apart from technical support and consultancy services, COR&FGA also provides high performance software products. Company's Banking Solutions covers all functionalities across retail and private banks' financial needs apart from services and software for automotive and mortgage finance institutions.  GmbH generated revenue of €23.3 million during financial year 2012.

Sopra group is a leader in consultancy services and financial solutions across Europe.  Sopra Banking Software follows the legendary path of parent company.  It is the preferred solution for over 500 customers across 70 countries.  Company's all seven products are highly preferred and deemed to be industry standard.

The proposed transaction values €13 million and will be paid in cash.  The transaction has been approved by Board of Directors.  It is expected to be as per Sopra Group's strategy for 2015 - 30% of group's revenue from software development.  The offer is based on locally developed products ideally suited for German market.  This acquisition is expected to increase client base for Sopra Financial Solutions and enhance the quality and services offered under GmbH and add value and innovation in existing product offerings.

Edgewood got PE backing: EPIC acquisition by carlyle

The Carlyle group has announced to buy a controlling stake in California based Edgewood Partners Insurance Centre (EPIC).

EPIC was established in 2007 in partnership with Stone Point Capital. Company has core capabilities in commercial lines and employee benefit insurance plans.  Apart from core capabilities company has developed its business across real estate, hospitality, construction and renewable energy.  California based company has approximately $80 million annual revenues.  It employees about 300 personal in ten offices across California.

The Carlyle group is global alternate asset management fund with $185 billion of Asset Under Management spread across 122 funds and 81 fund

of funds.  Company offices are spread over six continents employing 1450 persons in 34 offices. Carlyle's major investors are public pension funds.

This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval and is expected to complete by day end.  Although terms of deal are unknown, but this investment will enable EPIC to move further with its organic growth strategy.  Funds are expected to support strategic acquisitions across complementary insurance distribution platforms across United States.  The funds for the deal are supposed to be sourced from Carlyle Global Financial Services Partners L.P. and Carlyle Global Financial Services Partners II L.P. 

Thomson's insight into Russian Energy - Acquisition of Kortes

Thomson Reuters, leading media and information analytic multinational, on November 14, 2013 announced the acquisition of Kortes, a leading Russian energy and commodity information provider for an disclosed amount.  This combination will  solidify Thomson's coverage of Energy and commodity market in Russian Federation and Commonwealth of Independent States.

Russia is often coined as "Energy Superpower".  Country has the world's largest natural gas reserves, eighth largest oil reserves, second largest coal reserves.  Russia is world's leading natural gas exporter and second largest producer, apart from being largest oil producer and exporter.  In Energy front, Russia is third largest electricity producer and fifth largest renewable energy producer.

Kortes was established in 1991 to provide insights in Russian oil market.  Over the years it has established itself as most reliable and comprehensive information and analytics provider for oil, gas and energey market.  Company provides price monotoring, company profiling, statistics, market studies of whole energy and oil market of concerned region.  Kortes has over 400 subscribers which includes news agencies, state organizations apart from oil and energy companies from over the globe.

With this acquisition Thomson Reuters has expanded its wings in Russian commodity and energy sector.  This will be incorporate in company's financial market desktop Eikon.  This will give Eikon a further move on, which already provides real time insights to over 20,000 financial professionals. 

Twitter IPO: Way ahead for Tech start-ups

When market bell for Twitter (NYSE:TWTR) rang on November 7, 2013, it was a booming start.  It opened at $45.10 and closed at $44.90. This was approximately 73% upside of IPO price i.e. $26.

Twitter was another hot tech IPO and controversial too.  Although pricing of TWTR was not done on aggressive side, still market participants were sceptical over the move ahead. Thanks to the lesson that twitter learned from facebook's IPO.  Facebook which drumbled for many days, up-to now TWTR is going in a steady way.

But the discussion can not be completed with-out talking about the possible tech boomers which are in line for IPO.  Dropbox, Square, Snapchat, Pinterest, Uber, Box, Scribd, Flipboard are just to name a few.  Snapchat was recently in news for rejecting the facebook's offer of $3 billion.  Although most of tech startups, including Twitter is not profitable yet, still the craze that market makes on them gives them insane valuations.

Venture capitalists are putting huge money in these start-ups.  Pinterest, for say, raised $225 million recently and was valued at $4 billion. Company has recently started genrating revenue, so being profitable is a long term story.  Although twitter IPO has proved that being profitable is an irrelevant thing in valuation space, although it adds a value.  Moreover, theorists also configure on this point as valuation at any point of time depends on your all future cash flows, not just whether you are currently profitable and earning money or not.

But this tech bubble should stop some-where. This tech bubble should not repeat the insane valuations of the era of dot-com bubble.  Theorists and analysts have to converge somewhere and that should be a balancing boundary-line between value and bubble.