Quest Agrees To Buyout from Private Equity Firms -- Redmondmag.com

Quest Agrees To Buyout from Private Equity Firms

By Jeffrey Schwartz
06/20/2012

After months of uncertainty and speculation, Quest Software Inc. will remain independent.

Quest, a major provider of software tools for enterprise IT pros and developers, yesterday said that it has accepted a $2.2 billion offer from Insight Venture Partners and Vector Capital, which will take the company private.

Insight Partners had agreed to acquire Quest for $23 per share back in March but the terms allowed Quest to entertain superior offers. As reported last month, Dell was among those considering a bid for Quest. Though neither company confirmed the talks, they reportedly had collapsed. Having brought Vector Capital into the deal, the two private equity companies sweetened the bid to $25.75 per share.

For Dell, acquiring Quest would have bolstered its new software business headed by former IBM exec and CA CEO John Swainson. The deal to take Quest private should be welcome news to those wanting to see the company remain independent. Besides Dell, leading candidates to swoop up Quest included BMC Software, CA Technologies and Hewlett-Packard, among other heavyweights.

About the Author

Jeffrey Schwartz is editor of Redmond magazine and also covers cloud computing for Virtualization Review's Cloud Report. In addition, he writes the Channeling the Cloud column for Redmond Channel Partner. Follow him on Twitter @JeffreySchwartz.

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