Private Equity Firm Acquires SAP Partner Winshuttle -

Private equity firm Symphony Technology Group (STG) has acquired Winshuttle Holdings, an SAP partner and solutions provider focused on data automation. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Winshuttle, founded in 2003, has grown to more than 300 employees who support more than 2,200 customers and over 25,000 users in more than 65 countries, according to company estimates.

The private equity will allow Winshuttle to further scale its business globally, CEO John Pierson predicted in a prepared statement:

“This is an exciting step for Winshuttle that will allow us to leverage the tremendous expertise of STG to accelerate and scale our offering in the application data management space. This partnership will allow us to deepen and broaden the value we deliver to our very satisfied customer base comprised of many of the world’s largest brands.”

True believers include The Home Depot and Aecon, both of which leverage Winshuttle's Robotic Process Automation (RPA) solution. RPA streamlines SAP processes across a finance and shared services organization, including procure-to-pay, billing-to-cash, and project creation processes, the company says.

SAP Partners Attract Mergers, Acquisitions, Investments

SAP partners are attracting plenty of M&A activity and investment dollars. Additional deals ChannelE2E has tracked include:

Italian technology firm Techedge S.P.A. acquired the US-based NIMBL, a 100-person SAP Lighthouse Partner in March of 2018.
Private equity firm One Equity Partners acquired Rizing LLC, an SAP-focused provider of IT systems integration and implementation services in February of this year.
In November 2017, NTT Communications bought out Secure-24 Intermediate Holdings, a U.S.-based managed services provider (MSP) focused on hosted SAP, Oracle and Microsoft solutions.
Capgemini acquired Lyons Consulting Group in September 2017, a 300-person Salesforce Commerce Cloud, SAP Hybris and Magento partner.
Dublin, Ohio-based IT services and solutions provider Lightwell acquired BAAX LLC — a Columbus, Ohio-based consulting firm that specializes in SAP and Oracle data analytics.

SAP Partner Focus

SAP, meanwhile, continues to build out its partner network. In the months leading up to the SAP Sapphire Now 2018 conference in June, SAP has been praising small and midmarket partner engagements.

Winshuttle, based in Bothell, Washington, is widely respected within that SAP partner ecosystem, even ranking among the Top 25 SAP Solution Providers in 2017 by a third-party media site. In addition to developing software, Winshuttle offers training services for data-centric business processes that align with SAP's platforms.

Additional insights from Joe Panettieri.