Cleo Receives Strategic Growth Investment to Accelerate $5.5 Billion Ecosystem Integration Software Category
Investment validates need for enterprises to redefine their B2B integration approach amidst dynamic trade and economic shifts
ROCKFORD, ILLINOIS – June 9, 2021 – Cleo Communications (“Cleo” or the “Company”), a global provider of ecosystem integration software solutions, has received a significant investment from an affiliate of H.I.G. Capital (“H.I.G.”), a leading global alternative investment firm with $44 billion of equity capital under management. Terms were not disclosed.
Headquartered in Rockford, Illinois, Cleo is an ecosystem integration SaaS platform company that modernizes the movement and integration of B2B enterprise data. The Cleo Integration Cloud platform provides more than 4,000 customers worldwide with strategic supply chain visibility into revenue-critical end-to-end business processes across the ecosystems of partners and customers, marketplaces, and customers’ internal applications. Cleo’s solutions drive business agility, accelerate partner onboarding, automate key business processes, and capture new revenue streams through application, B2B, and data integration technologies.
“We are extremely excited to welcome H.I.G. Capital as an investment partner in Cleo as we continue executing on our mission to redefine B2B integration in the cloud, solidifying Cleo’s position as the pioneer and global leader of the ecosystem integration software category,” said Mahesh Rajasekharan, President and CEO of Cleo. “Given their deep domain knowledge and our shared vision for creating customer value, H.I.G.’s investment clearly validates the momentum and acceleration of ecosystem integration adoption. It also underscores our mutual conviction that Cleo’s strategy of helping businesses manage rapid growth by improving supply chain visibility and control through cloud integration technology, will continue creating expansive value for our customers and their ecosystem trading partners, while rapidly accelerating Cleo’s market leadership.”
According to Gartner, the Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS), Managed File Transfer Suites (MFT), and B2B Gateway Software (Stand-alone) subsegments in the Application Infrastructure and Middleware market, worldwide represent $5.5 billion in annual revenues in 2021 and are expected to grow to $7.1 billion by 2024.[1] Cleo is disrupting these markets with its ecosystem integration platform as adoption proliferates in light of eCommerce-driven digital transformation.
“To compete successfully, companies across industries need to master increasingly complex B2B information flows and integrate the applications running the enterprise. Cleo has the platform that helps its clients meet these challenges. The Company is positioned for further growth as eCommerce and the exponential market growth of digital information flows continue to expand the need for user-friendly, rapidly deployed and feature-rich platforms like Cleo’s,” said Timur Akazhanov, Managing Director of H.I.G. “We believe Cleo offers best-in-class cloud integration platform technology following years of heavy investment in product development, which is now earning high praise from customers, and is being adopted at a robust rate. We are thrilled to partner with Mahesh and the Cleo team to continue to accelerate the Company’s growth trajectory.”
Previously, Cleo was backed by an investor group led by Alpine Investors and Peterson Partners.
UBS Investment Bank served as exclusive financial advisor to Cleo. Guggenheim Securities LLC and Harris Williams served as financial advisors to H.I.G.
About Cleo Communications
Cleo is an ecosystem integration software company whose solutions simplify the movement and integration of critical B2B enterprise data, thereby enabling business agility and business flow visibility. The Cleo Integration Cloud (“CIC”) is a cloud-based platform that brings end-to-end integration visibility across API, EDI, and non-EDI integrations and gives technical and business users the confidence and capability to rapidly onboard trading partners, enable integration between applications, and accelerate revenue-generating business processes. Headquartered in Rockford, Illinois, Cleo serves more than 4,000 customers globally with a focus on the manufacturing, wholesale & distribution, and logistics end-markets.
About H.I.G. Capital
H.I.G. is a leading global private equity and alternative assets investment firm with $44 billion of equity capital under management.* Based in Miami, and with offices in New York, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Atlanta in the U.S., as well as international affiliate offices in London, Hamburg, Madrid, Milan, Paris, Bogotá, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, H.I.G. specializes in providing both debt and equity capital to small and mid-sized companies, utilizing a flexible and operationally focused/ value-added approach:
1. H.I.G.’s equity funds invest in management buyouts, recapitalizations and corporate carve-outs of both profitable as well as underperforming manufacturing and service businesses
2. H.I.G.’s debt funds invest in senior, unitranche and junior debt financing to companies across the size spectrum, both on a primary (direct origination) basis, as well as in the secondary markets. H.I.G. is also a leading CLO manager, through its WhiteHorse family of vehicles, and manages a publicly traded BDC, WhiteHorse Finance.
3. H.I.G.’s real estate funds invest in value-added properties, which can benefit from improved asset management practices.
Since its founding in 1993, H.I.G. has invested in and managed more than 300 companies worldwide. The firm's current portfolio includes more than 100 companies with combined sales in excess of $30 billion. For more information, please refer to the H.I.G. website at www.higcapital.com.
* Based on total capital commitments managed by H.I.G. Capital and affiliates.
[1] Gartner, ‘Forecast: Enterprise Infrastructure Software, Worldwide, 2019-2025 1Q21 Update’, Vanitha Dsilva, Laurie Wurster, et al, 23 March 2021
