Private equity firm KKR is acquiring BMC Software from an investor group for an undisclosed sum. The deal, confirmed today, had been rumored for several weeks.
BMC Software went private in 2013. Since that time, "BMC has reallocated hundreds of millions of dollars toward higher growth R&D and go-to-market initiatives to address the massive digital disruption that is taking place in industries around the globe," the company claims.
Ironically, the so-called digital disruption also pressured BMC's own business. The IT management software company grew up in the age of client-server systems, competing against entrenched rivals like CA Technologies, Hewlett-Packard Co. and IBM.
New Competition, New Business Models
But in recent years, the hottest IT service management (ITSM) and infrastructure management companies have had so-called cloud-scale business models. Names like Cisco's AppDynamics, Data Dog, Dynatrace, New Relic and ServiceNow have enjoyed rapid growth as companies and service providers pursued new ways to manage on-premies and cloud workloads along with associated service desks.
For its part, BMC has introduced numerous cloud- and application-centric monitoring and management tools. The company continues to serve roughly 92 of the Forbes Global 100 list, as well as 10,000 customers worldwide.
It sounds like BMC CEO Peter Leav will continue to lead the company under KKR's ownership. Leav joined BMC in December 2016. He previously was president and CEO of Polycom.
Financial terms of the KKR-BMC Software deal were not disclosed.
