Business News

arvato AG acquires International Gothia Financial Group

Thursday 25. April 2013 - The Bertelsmann subsidiary arvato AG is acquiring Gothia Financial Group headquartered in Norway and thereby combining its financial services activities.

The combination with its subsidiary arvato infoscore as a nucleus makes arvato Europe’s number 3 in the fast growing field of Business Information and Financial Services with a combined revenue of more than EUR 500 million . arvato and Herkules Capital, a leading Norwegian Private Equity firm which has owned Gothia since 2008, have agreed not to disclose any financial details.
Gothia Financial Group is a full-service provider for the entire invoice process chain. The company offers its clients solutions that range from invoicing to accounts receivable and liabilities management. With over 1,200 employees and more than 2,000 clients, Gothia is very well established in the Scandinavian countries as well as the UK and Ireland region and has distinct growth opportunities in the GSA region, comprising Germany, Switzerland and Austria, as well as the Netherlands and Spain.
With the combination, arvato will advance the internationalization of its business information and financial services activities and be able to offer its payment handling solutions to clients all over Europe going forward. In particular, arvato will benefit from Gothia’s strong service portfolio in the rapidly growing eCommerce segment as well as in factoring. Potential is to be unlocked notably through the pan-European use of the PayByBill payment solution established by Gothia. Integration of this product rounds out arvato infoscore’s portfolio in B2C factoring, which includes its own Trust’nPay solution.
Achim Berg, CEO of arvato AG and member of the executive board of Bertelsmann, said: “The combination of arvato infoscore and Gothia has compelling logic for us – it serves both the arvato and the Bertelsmann strategy and meets investment criteria perfectly. The market for business information shows an attractive, lasting dynamic and enables high rates of profitable growth. Given the low cyclicality, we’re expanding into a highly resilient market strongly driven by growth areas like eCommerce.”
Rikke Tobiasson Reinemo, Partner Herkules Capital, stated: “Gothia has become a leading European credit management solutions provider with a unique ability to service the entire credit management solutions value chain. During Herkules’ ownership, Gothia has substantially strengthened its organization, market presence and product portfolio at the same time as having solid earnings growth every year. We have had a great cooperation with the strong management team.”
Michael Weinreich, member of the executive board of arvato AG and CEO of arvato infoscore, commented: “The acquisition is mainly focused on combining geographically complementary services. Moreover, we will be able to offer all customers attractive new services in the field of business information. The workforce at Gothia’s operating locations plays a crucial part here. I am pleased that Trond Kristian Andreassen is taking a key role in driving ahead the combination as deputy CEO of arvato infoscore.”
Trond Kristian Andreassen, current CEO of Gothia Financial Group A.S., added: “arvato infoscore is an ideal partner for us. Both our companies have similar business models and complementary regional areas. We both also have a corporate culture committed to the entrepreneurial spirit.”
The transaction, which has to be approved by the anti-trust and bank supervisory authorities, is expected to be completed by mid-year 2013.