GEAC Computer Corporation, the Canadian computer software supplier, has acquired JBA Holdings, the parent company of JBA Ireland, in a deal worth £116 million (€147 million).
The acquisition makes Geac the world's fourth largest supplier of enterprise application software and could lead to an expansion of its subsidiary operation in Ireland.
The managing director of JBA Ireland, Mr Pat Chambers, said the deal would serve to strengthen the company by providing a wider geographical spread of operations.
"JBA was big in Europe while Geac was big in America. Now 40 per cent of revenue is European, 40 per cent American and 20 per cent is from the Australian and Asian market," he said.
Mr Chambers said the acquisition could lead to more jobs at the JBA Ireland plant in Sandycove and an expansion of the Irish subsidiary due to the synergy of the new company resulting from the deal.
"With the momentum in the whole ERP [enterprise resource planning] sector beyond the year 2000 we anticipate growth," he added.
JBA Ireland produces integrated software systems for the manufacturing sector. It employs 100 people at its plant in Sandycove, Dublin. Mr Chambers said the new company would be able to provide a greater research and development budget and offer customers more products.
Under the terms of the acquisition JBA Holdings will become the enterprise resource planning division of Geac and will continue to develop, support and sell its own products.
Geac will follow a policy of using its size and finances to support JBA's divisions and to assist in business infrastructure but it will leave day-to-day management to the division team.
It will continue to focus on its primary business providing mission critical software and systems to corporations.
Geac offers cross-industry business solutions in the fields of hospitality, hospitality systems, property applications, publication systems and banking systems. Geac also provides a range of services in public safety, libraries and network systems.
President of Geac, Mr Doug Bergeron, said JBA's management style fitted the Geac model exactly and they could achieve more profit together than they could independently.
"JBA brings us great customers, great products and most importantly great people," said Mr Bergeron.
Geac and JBA have a combined annual revenue of over $1.3 billion, a customer base of 30,000, and more than 6,000 employees in 70 countries worldwide.
This makes the company the fourth largest enterprise applications supplier behind SAP, Oracle and Peoplesoft.
