February is short of days but not short of deals, including the SCD transaction Dyflex/FiveV

2. Pemba Capital partners with ctrl:cyber
ctrl:cyber, an early-adopter of subscription cybersecurity services, has partnered with Pemba Capital Partners to capture the growing demand for tailored cybersecurity services. Pemba Capital Partners (Pemba), an investor in high-growth, founder-led businesses has partnered with ctrl:cyber (Ctrl), a specialist cybersecurity firm. Founded in 2017, Ctrl was built with a clear mission in mind: to bridge the gap between business operations and cybersecurity. This guiding principle remains at the core of Ctrl today, ensuring complex technical concepts are distilled into clear, actionable insights. Under founder & CEO Steve Williams, Ctrl has grown into a team of 50+ specialists, providing business-first cybersecurity solutions. Through its Risk Operations Centre subscription service, Ctrl now supports a portfolio of over 300 clients, including industry leaders such as Toll, Charter Hall and NIB. From its early days, Ctrl adopted the approach to onboard individuals with an entrepreneurial mindset to help drive board level business outcomes and harbour a culture that gives the cybersecurity talent of tomorrow a chance.

3. Akkodis acquires Australian Microsoft partner Barhead Solutions
Digital engineering and solutions consultancy Akkodis – formed through the merger of Modis and AKKA in 2022 – has acquired Sydney-based Microsoft applications specialist Barhead Solutions. Owned by human resources giant Adecco, and arriving in Australia in 2023, Akkodis is the result of a merger between subsidiaries Modis and AKKA, creating a global entity with over 50,000 tech professionals in 30 countries worldwide. That figure included a headcount of 1,300-plus across its Australian practice, a number which will be boosted again through the purchase of Barhead Solutions, a Sydney-based Microsoft business applications consultancy established in 2016.

4. 5G Networks now officially in control of AUCyber’s future
5GN executives take up board positions. Following two months of uncertainty, 5G Networks has acquired a controlling interest in Australian cyber security firm AUCyber. 5GN informed AUCyber and the Australian Stock Exchange early on January 4 that it was now in possession of more than half of AUCyber’s shares. AUCyber responded shortly before 2pm on the same day. While AUCyber had initially contested 5GN’s takeover bid, telling its shareholders to refrain from selling their shares to 5GN, AUCyber is now recommending its shareholders do so, and sooner rather than later.

5. Decision Revolution joins management consultancy firm Parbery
Canberra-based management consultancy Parbery has acquired Decision Revolution, with founder Belinda Newham joining the firm as a partner and practice leader. Established as a social enterprise in 2022, Decision Revolution provides consultancy and training services to government and corporate clients focused on improving decision-making in a time of increasing complexity. Newham joins Parbery as an Organisational Transformation partner, leading its team delivering communication, change management, workforce design and coaching services to its public, private and for-purpose sector clients. Parbery said the two companies’ shared commitment to integrity and social responsibility would deliver even greater value to its clients, combining Decision Revolution’s solutions which highlight stakeholder impact and foster inclusive and effective outcomes with the people-first philosophy it brings to its own comprehensive range of management consulting services. As per its website, Decision Revolution contends that traditional decision-making processes are no longer adequate to address the challenges of an increasingly complex and interconnected world, and so applies a people-centred approach to innovation and problem-solving with a greater emphasis on diversity and collaboration – balancing the analytical with the people side of the equation.

6. Ethos Urban’s majority investment from Colliers
Ethos Urban, a leading Australian urban planning and strategic advisory practice, entered an agreement for Colliers to acquire a majority shareholding creating a new Australian planning and strategic advisory service line for Colliers across Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. Leading diversified professional services and investment management company, Colliers (NASDAQ, TSX: CIGI), announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire a controlling interest in Ethos Urban Pty Limited (“Ethos Urban”), an award-winning urban planning and design advisory firm in Australia. Ethos Urban’s senior leadership team will remain significant shareholders in the business under Colliers’ unique partnership model. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the first half of 2025. The business will be rebranded as Colliers in the second half of 2025. Founded in 1992, Ethos Urban employs 160 professionals across its three offices in Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane, providing planning, urban design, engagement and economic & social advisory services for public and private sector clients.

7. Banyan Software acquires Healthcare Technology Leader, Medtech Global
Banyan Software, a global software investor with a growing footprint in Australia and New Zealand, has acquired Medtech Global, a leading provider of health technology to the Australian and New Zealand markets. Banyan has acquired 100% of the shares in Medtech Global. The company was previously owned by Advent Partners, an Australian private equity firm, and Geoffrey Sayer, the CEO/Managing Director of Medtech Global. The acquisition includes Medtech Evolution and Medtech Artia Practice Management Systems, Medeor® payment solutions, and Medtech ALEX, an ecosystem of third-party digital healthcare applications. Sayer will remain as CEO under Banyan’s ownership, and Medtech’s senior leadership team will remain in place. Founded in 1989 and headquartered in Auckland, New Zealand, Medtech collaborated with medical centres and healthcare practitioners to develop the country’s first Practice Management System.  In 2020, Sayer and Advent Partners acquired Medtech Global from its previous owners. As CEO/Managing Director, Sayer led Medtech’s innovation programs with the development of ALEX® and Medeor® with further expansions into Australia under way. With Banyan, Medtech will continue to lead in health tech innovation across Australia and New Zealand.

8. Schwartz family-backed Armitage Associates buys ERP software firm
Buyout firm Armitage Associates’ latest portfolio investment, signed earlier this month, is smack-bang in its wheelhouse. Street Talk can reveal the Melbourne-based growth equity investor, which is backed by the powerful Schwartz family, has acquired a majority stake in Redcat, an ERP software provider to the hospitality industry. Redcat provides an integrated end-to-end system including point of sale, accounting and business management tools for cafés, restaurants, bars and franchises. While its Armitage’s first foray into the sector, the Mark de Ambrosis-led firm has had plenty of success with ERP businesses, particularly in health and education where it has ruled off a handful of exits. Redcat is expected to be housed in Armitage’s fourth fund, with de Ambrosis slated to join its board. The private equity firm was attracted by the hospitality sector’s fragmented nature and plans to ramp up Redcat’s global expansion plans, limited partner sources told this column. Prior to Armitage’s investment, Redcat was majority-owned by its directors, Jeff Lamb, Lawrence Pelletier, Pepe Ochoa and Frank Tarantino, who each held an 18.9 per cent piece of the company, or 75.6 per cent collectively, according to the ASIC register. The four took the reins of the business under a management buyout in 2017 and are expected to remain with Redcat under Armitage’s stewardship.

9. Zendesk to acquire Australian AWS partner Local Measure
Customer service software company Zendesk has signed an agreement to acquire Local Measure, an Australian provider of CCaaS and advanced voice solutions. Zendesk intends to use the acquisition to accelerate its expansion into larger, more complex service environments, enhance its AI voice capabilities and strengthen its integration with Amazon Connect, AWS’ AI-powered, cloud contact centre solution. Local Measure’s technology enables businesses to implement call routing, leverage AI-powered automation and unify inbound service and outbound sales and marketing efforts.  Local Measure signed a multi-year strategic collaboration agreement with AWS towards the end of 2022, with CEO Jonathan Barouch telling the audience at that year’s AWS re:Invent event that it had grown revenue 500 percent year on year, in part due to the benefits for customers of the company’s Amazon Connect-based Engage contact centre solution. The proposed acquisition is subject to the satisfaction of customary conditions, including Local Measure’s shareholder approval and necessary regulatory and Australian Court approvals. The transaction is currently expected to close in May 2025.

10. Ipsos acquires Whereto Research
Ipsos, one of the world’s leading market research companies, today announces the acquisition of Whereto Research, a key player in public sector research in Australia. This heralds an exciting leap forward and new standards of excellence for the Australian social research sector. Based primarily in Melbourne, Whereto Research is renowned for its expertise in public policies and government communication evaluation. The combination of  Whereto’s industry leading consultants, creative ways of tackling complex social issues, and reputation for providing clear, practical and elegant solutions, with Ipsos’ Public Affairs’ thought leadership, best-in-field ethical AI and data security, establishes an industry first. This acquisition is highly complementary to Ipsos Australia’s existing research expertise, and its Public Affairs business is also a leader in Household Travel surveys, Patient Experience, environment and sustainability, healthcare services, polling, Indigenous issues and private health insurance.

11. Publicis Groupe acquires Australia’s biggest indie media shop Atomic212 with global CoreAI platform, additional services to roll out
French communications giant Publicis Groupe has acquired Australia’s largest independent media agency, Atomic 212, in a move ANZ boss Mike Rebelo acknowledged was counter to many of his rivals steering away from media agency acquisitions because of structural shifts and challenges in the broader media sector.  The Atomic 212 acquisition, announced to staff this morning, includes a four-year earnout for Atomic’s dozen or so leadership team who own equity but will remain an independent operation inside the Publicis Media unit, which houses Spark Foundry, Zenith and Starcom. The Publicis deal caps more than eight months of feverish conjecture over a possible Accenture acquisition of Atomic 212 to fast-start its media buying and planning ambitions across Asia-Pacific.

12. Global tech consulting ecosystem Alan Allman buys Sydney’s PhoenixDX
Sydney-based digital services and advisory firm PhoenixDX has been acquired by Alan Allman Associates, a Paris-headquartered network of tech consultancies with its eyes on the APAC region. PhoenixDX, which was established in Sydney by Pedro Carrilho and later Juan Martin from 2016, becomes the first Australian member of the Euronext-listed firm, following its earlier purchase of Asian IT consultancy We+ in late 2023. A leading regional partner of the OutSystems low-code platform, PhoenixDX specialises in the rapid development of digital products and custom software, supported by a team of 80-plus technicians spread across Australia and the Philippines. A former chief operating officer at Altran (now Capgemini Engineering), Thual established Alan Allman Associates in Paris in 2009, since overseeing its growth to an ‘ecosystem’ of more than one and a half dozen tech consultancies spread across Europe, North America, and most recently the Asia Pacific. The company’s annual revenues are now trending toward the €400 million mark. Having grown that figure tenfold over the past decade, Alan Allman Associates in 2023 turned its attention to the Asia Pacific for the next step in its international expansion agenda, picking up Singapore-based We+, which has a further presence in Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Taiwan. Now, the firm has gained a further foothold in the region through the majority purchase of PhoenixDX.