Sophos snapped up by US Thomas Bravo for £3.08m

US private equity, Thomas Bravo has acquired Sophos, a UK cyber security company for £.308m ($3.9bn).

Sophos, the FTSE 250 company based in Abingdon near Oxford employs 3, 400 people,  specialising in antivirus and encryption produts, based in England, which mainly serves small and medium-sized  businesses, is the latest UK company to be acquired by a foreign buying maximising the weak pound,  said it was approached by Thomas Bravo in June 2019. Kris Hagerman, CEO, said that the offer of $7.40 a share in cash, a 37 per cent premium on last week’s closing price was “pretty compelling, and Thomas Bravo intended to keep Sophos as a standalone company and give it the opportunity to continue to grow , expand and execute in its own markets”.

Private buyout firm and leading shareholders, Apax and the group’s founders have accep.ted the deal.

Thomas Bravo also acquired Sopho’s rival Barracuda in 2017 and has added Imperva, Veracode, LogRhythm and is interested in acquiring Symantec’s Norton and McAfee’s antivirus brands last year.

Sophos was founded in 1985 and floated in 2015  for £1bn and its share price has since doubled but it has withstood a “rocky journey” in the last couple of years although their revenues rose  11 per cent to  $562m ($711m).