IT market showed high mobility in 2022

Information technology mergers and acquisitions did not show the same intensity in terms of value in 2022 compared to other years. For example, in 2021 for a single acquisition, that of Intrasoft from the Danish Netcompany, a price of 225 million euros was recorded, with the value of all acquisitions in 2022 not even half of that amount.

Nevertheless, few would dispute that the mobility recorded in 2022 was significant and was a product of the increasing growth rates of an industry with strong demand from the private and public sectors. At the same time, the new year will be particularly crucial for the progress of digital projects being bankrolled through the Recovery Fund, which should be completed in three years, by the end of 2025, according to the binding timetables of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.

Given these facts, IT and technology companies are seeking ways to strengthen their presence inside and outside of Greece through associations that bring more strength.

The biggest transaction of 2022 concerned the acquisition of Byte by Ideal Holdings for €60 million, allowing the group of Lambros Papakonstantinou to intensify its activity in the IT market. Byte has a portfolio, to be implemented, of projects worth tens of millions of euros.

One of the last deals of 2022, which went under the radar of the market, concerns the acquisition of Greek company Nimaworks (it develops software for businesses and is a partner of the Australian Atlassian) by multinational group Adaptavist for a price of €1.5 million. The two entities specialize in IT service management (ITSM), a market whose value is set at €15.5 billion by 2027.

Epsilon Net also signed a cooperation memorandum with National Bank in November, with the latter acquiring 7.5% of the IT company’s share capital for €30 million. Within three years from the completion of the transaction, National will have the option to acquire a further 7.5%, gaining access to a wide customer base of small and medium enterprises, estimated at 125,000. 

With this initiative, National is expanding its banking operations and financing to small and medium enterprises and gaining access to a wide range of individual businesses and freelancers through the cooperation they have with 16,000 accounting offices that use Epsilon Net applications.