Interactive
Isle of Man – Optimal Payments to buy rival Skrill for €1.1bn
By Phil - 23 March 2015
Optimal Payments, a global provider of online and mobile payment processing services, has entered into an agreement to acquire Sentinel Topco, which includes Skrill, for €1.1bn.
The Skrill Group is one of Europe’s leading digital payments businesses providing digital wallet solutions and online payment processing capabilities and is one of the largest prepaid online voucher providers in Europe with its paysafecard brand.
The Directors of Optimal Payments believe that the acquisition will be transformational and value enhancing for Optimal Payments and will create a leading payment and digital wallet provider with significant international scale and reach that is well positioned to capitalise on the substantial and growing payment processing and digital wallet markets, particularly within the rapidly expanding online gambling sector.
Completion of the Acquisition is expected in the third quarter of 2015.
Dennis Jones, Chairman of Optimal Payments, said: “We are taking advantage of an exceptional opportunity to acquire a business we know very well which, combined with Optimal Payments, will be a leading UK based online payments business with the essential scale necessary to be highly successful. These opportunities are few and far between. The Board believes this transformational transaction will be earnings accretive for shareholders from the first full fiscal year of ownership, will further diversify our client base and, additionally, will enable us to deliver enhanced services to existing and prospective merchants and customers in all of our global markets.”
Joel Leonoff, President and Chief Executive Officer of Optimal Payments, said: “Over the past four years, we have successfully delivered signifi cant growth in revenues and earnings for our shareholders. This growth resulted from executing our strategy to generate high levels of organic growth supplemented by accretive acquisitions. The acquisition of Skrill will create a global tech champion in the fast growing digital payments space, and we believe represents a transformational leap forward that greatly accelerates our strategic plan. The Optimal Payments Management team is extremely excited about the future prospects for the Company. The combined business will be quoted in the UK and will be of sufficient scale for us to seek a main market listing and FTSE250 inclusion as soon as possible following completion of the acquisition.”
