Aveva accepts £9.9bn takeover offer from Schneider Electric

Aveva Group plc’s shareholders have accepted a £9.9billion takeover offer from Schneider Electric.

The French industrial giant became Aveva’s largest shareholder in 2017 in a reverse takeover which saw a 60 per cent stake in the software engineering company sold for £550m.

A full acquisition offer in September 2021 had been rejected by Aveva, but Schneider increased its offer to 3,225p per share earlier this month.

Aveva had its beginnings as the government CADCentre in 1967. The CADCentre was a government-funded research institute created by the UK Ministry of Technology, with a mission to develop computer-aided design techniques and promote their take-up by British industry. Some of its initial technology – the operating system and graphics software – came from the University Computer Laboratory.

Aveva has developed into a global industrial and engineering software provider offering solutions that solve design, process, maintenance, training and information flow problems for customers in 30 countries. It has a headcount of 1,700 people working in the energy, marine, paper and chemicals sectors.

“For our customers, we will continue to deliver world-class products and services,” said Peter Herweck, CEO of Aveva. “This transaction will help us to accelerate our customers’ digital transformation and their journey to efficiency and sustainability.

“We will remain an autonomous business, operating under the Aveva name and brand,” Herweck added. “With increased investment in R&D, it will allow us to build our neutral and agnostic data platform in the cloud faster, and help our customers materialise the value of their data with our software solutions more seamlessly.”

Market analysts raised concerns that the deal takes Aveva’s autonomy overseas, resulting in possible loss of influence for the UK operation – and that the sum involved is low, due to the falling value of sterling, which leaves other UK companies vulnerable.

Shares in the company rose very slightly up 0.3 percent to 3,192 pence following the approval of the offer which has been backed by Aveva’s board.