Thoma Bravo buying back SailPoint for $6.9 billion
- Dan Primack, author of Axios Pro Rata
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
Thoma Bravo agreed to buy Austin, Texas-based enterprise cybersecurity firm SailPoint Technologies (NYSE: SAIL) for $6.9 billion. The deal includes a 35-day go-shop provision, and works out to $65.25 per share (31.6% premium to Friday's close).
Why it matters: Private equity is entering a new normal on debt financing, preferring private credit over bank loans that may struggle to get syndicated due to geopolitical instability.
- For Thoma Bravo, that means tapping the same lenders that it used for the recent $10.7 billion Anaplan buyout: Golub Capital, Blackstone Credit and Owl Rock.
History: Thoma Bravo previously bought SailPoint from venture capital funds in 2014 for an undisclosed amount, and then took it public in 2017 at $12 per share.
The bottom line: The massive price appreciation is chalked up to SailPoint converting much of its business from on-premise to SaaS, plus increased CISO focus on identity governance. A source says that Thoma Bravo's plan is to finish the SaaS conversion, and to help SailPoint become a consolidator of the broader identity access management market.