Enprise Group has sold the assets of its EMS-Cortex division to Citrix in a deal that Enprise CEO Mark Loveys believes is the largest local deal in the past 10 years, although the price has not been disclosed.
Citrix will acquire the assets and intellectual property around the New Zealand-developed Cortex cloud control panel software, which automates the provisioning and service of applications delivered via the cloud computing model.
Cortex has an international customer base ranging from small hosting companies to large telcos with hundreds of thousands of users. They include Telecom New Zealand, TELUS of Canada, and Vodacom, South Africa’s largest telco.
Last year, Unisys selected Cortex for its new global services platform. The company also has a global partnership agreement with Microsoft.
Loveys says that Citrix, which has revenues of US$1.8 billion, will provide great on-going career opportunities for the 20 EMS-Cortex staff.
“I understand that Citrix will continue to locate the Cortex development team in New Zealand for the foreseeable future and will develop the software as a key part of its global cloud computing strategy,” he says.
“This is also a great result for our backers, TMT Ventures, and for other Enprise Group shareholders. It is very satisfying to see investors get such a rewarding outcome.”
The TMT investment includes the New Zealand government Venture Investment Fund.
Loveys says EMS-Cortex was originally acquired by the Enprise Group as part of an investment packed negotiated with TMT Ventures through Howard and Co in 2005.
“Back then, EMS-Cortex was ahead of mainstream market demand for this type of product. Our strategy was to build the software and the customer base, leveraging the rapid growth in demand for cloud infrastructure.
“Cortex is now well established and highly regarded as a market leader in the cloud control panel space. The time was right for a major international player such as Citrix to take the product and the people who have developed and supported it to the next level in the global marketplace.”
EMS-Cortex is the second international sale with which the Enprise management team has been involved. They were the original developers of the Exonet business software package – now MYOB EXO – which was sold to Solution 6 for $30 million in 2000.