Altus Group Completes Acquisition of Finance Active

TORONTO & PARIS (April 1, 2021) – Altus Group Limited (ʺAltus Groupʺ or “the Company”) (TSX: AIF), a global provider of commercial real estate (“CRE”) software, data solutions and services, announced that it has completed the transaction to acquire Finance Active SAS (“Finance Active”), a leading provider of debt management SaaS solutions for treasury and investment management.  The Company previously announced on March 9, 2021 that it had entered into an agreement to purchase Finance Active.

The acquisition has a number of expected strategic benefits for Altus Group, including:

• Accelerating its expansion and speed-to-market in the debt asset class, an attractive adjacency with a sizeable and growing total addressable market for its Altus Analytics business
• Enhancing its global CRE asset and investment management capabilities with a market leading debt management SaaS solution, providing for broadened reach across customer segments, use cases and workflows
• Growing the Company’s geographic footprint in Europe, a strategic market for Altus Group, with a high-performing and culturally aligned team of approximately 160 professionals and over 3,000 software customers
• Enhancing Altus Analytics’ recurring revenue base and growth profile while providing attractive cross-sell synergies

“The acquisition of Finance Active is a critical step to accelerate our growth in the debt asset class, a high-value adjacency that fits very well with our strategic roadmap and addresses client demand,” said Mike Gordon, CEO of Altus Group.  “Expanding our offerings into debt management will enable our customers to have a 360-degree view of their investments, helping them maximize value and better manage risk performance.  We look forward to combining our talented teams and complementary solutions to better serve our clients.”

“As the founders of Finance Active, Jacques Descourtieux and I are incredibly proud of what our team has built and accomplished over the past two decades in establishing a market leading treasury and investment management solution,” said Patrice Chatard, co-founder and co-CEO of Finance Active.  “Joining Altus Group represents an exciting new chapter for Finance Active, positioning us for continued growth and innovation by enhancing the value we can provide for our esteemed clients and our team, and fueling our expansion into new markets.”

Founded in 2000, Finance Active is a leading European provider of debt management and financial risk management SaaS solutions for treasury and investment management serving public, corporate and financial institutions.   Utilizing its multi-tenant and API-friendly SaaS cloud platform, its solutions help clients digitize and automate time-consuming and complex tasks with a centralized view of real-time financial information and a wide range of monitoring, valuation, reporting and benchmarking tools.  The company is headquartered in Paris, France, with a wide geographic footprint in Europe including over 3,000 customers ranging from small-to-medium businesses to large, global institutions.  Finance Active’s team of approximately 160 professionals will be integrated with the Company’s Altus Analytics business.

The transaction is expected to strengthen the Company’s recurring revenue base while providing opportunities for both acquisitive and organic growth to Altus Group’s 2021 revenues and Adjusted EBITDA. As a market leader, Finance Active has steadily been growing its topline, generating gross revenue of approximately €25.0 million (approximately C$38.3 million) in 2020.  Supported by multi-year subscription contracts and a mid-90% gross retention rate, approximately 90% of Finance Active’s revenues are recurring, consistent with Altus Group’s Over Time revenue definition.  Over the past three years Adjusted EBITDA margins have been in the 20% range.  As required by IFRS, Altus Group will have an accounting adjustment on Finance Active’s deferred revenues in 2021 which will also impact the Adjusted EBITDA margins in 2021 before they return to a more normalized run-rate in 2022.  Longer term, with the enhanced growth profile provided by joining Altus Group, Finance Active’s profitability and Adjusted EBITDA margins are expected to increase. The acquisition is expected to be financially accretive to Altus Group’s adjusted EPS starting in 2022.

The purchase price of this acquisition was approximately €106.5 million (approximately C$157.7 million), subject to adjustments.  On closing, Altus Group paid a total of €89.2 million (approximately C$132.1 million) in cash, funded by drawing down on the Company’s credit facility.  In addition, Altus Group issued 303,177 common shares to certain members of Finance Active’s management team, in consideration of the acquisition of their shares. These common shares will be held in escrow and will vest and be released over three years on each anniversary of the closing date, subject to continued employment and compliance with certain terms and conditions.  As part of the purchase price, €4.8 million of cash (approximately C$7.1 million) is payable over two years after closing, subject to certain conditions being met.