Friday, June 12, 2009

Entrust Details Acquisition Process, Reaffirms Thoma Bravo Deal

Dallas-based Entrust has released a detailed breakdown of the firm's efforts to find alternative buyers for the firm, which has agreed to be acquired by private equity firm Thoma Bravo. According to Entrust, a supplier of secure web certificates, it contacted 35 separate parties to discuss proposals to acquire the company. The firm said 11 executed NDAs to give them access to the firm's financial, other information, and the company's management team. Finally, the firm said it received three, written, non-binding "indications of interest" from three firms, which included another private equity firm and two "modestly-sized" operating companies. The firm said that--although those all provided a higher per-share price for the company--due to financing and other conditions, none were considered a "superior proposal" within the terms of its merger agreement with Thoma Bravo. As a result, the firm is recommending that shareholders vote for the merger proposal involving Thoma Bravo.