Cloud and IT services firm Version 1 has acquired Belfast, Northern Ireland-headquartered Neueda to expand its reach in financial services and other markets.
It is Version 1's biggest acquisition to date, although its exact value has not been disclosed. In the year ended 31 March 2020, Neueda said it achieved 38% revenue growth to £32.1m, with a profit before tax of £2.3m - up from £1.7m the previous year. The UK accounts for 71% of its revenue, with a further 27% coming from the US.
Version 1 has previously acquired Cedar Consulting and Presidion in 2018, TE4B in 2019 and Singlepoint last year.
Founded in Belfast in 2002, Neueda has long-standing relationships with customers across the public and private sectors and partnerships with the likes of JP Morgan, Citi, Liberty I.T., Credit Suisse and Microsoft.
Combined, the businesses will have almost 2,000 employees, more than 500 customers and project revenue of €200m in the next year. Its operations are spread across Ireland, the UK, the US, Spain and India.
Following the acquisition, the Neueda executive management team, including chief executive officer Paddy O’Hagan, will join the Version 1 team to help grow its digital and cloud practice in Northern Ireland.
O’Hagan said: “With Version 1 and Neueda combining our technical capability across our mutual customers in Northern Ireland, we can continue to deliver excellent customer experiences while tapping into the breadth of Version 1 resources and services to solve a wider variety of IT challenges and transformations.”
Version 1 said the acquisition adds additional scale and capabilities to its growing digital and cloud business, with Neueda bringing expertise in digital transformation, trading technology, data analytics, cloud services, KDB+ and accelerated delivery platforms.
CEO of Version 1 Tom O’Connor said: “We are accelerating our growth ambitions as a combined entity, delivering real differences for our clients and providing best-in-market career opportunities for the most talented technical minds.”
Neueda Training and its 5G operations in the Athlone area are unaffected by the transaction.
Version 1 and Neueda have now launched a recruitment drive in Northern Ireland for all levels of technology-related positions.
Picture: Paddy O'Hagan, Neueda CEO (left) and Tom O'Connor, Version 1 CEO