Sad news to report: Thoma Bravo has relapsed. It’s important to remember that M&A addiction is a disease and we must treat them with compassion during this difficult, multi-billion dollar binge…

Another day, another tech company dragged off the public markets and locked in the basement of private equity. Verint Systems, the call center software outfit that makes sure your “your call is important to us” nightmare runs smoothly, is going private in a $2 billion all-cash deal with Thoma Bravo. 

(Source: Giphy) 

Shareholders get $20.50 a share, an 18% premium over where the stock was before rumors leaked. The board signed off, 14.5% of the vote is already in the bag, and by year-end Verint will be gone… a.k.a, delisted, de-guided, debriefed, and just a black box feeding returns to Thoma Bravo’s $184 billion empire. But why now? Well, Verint has been pivoting to “AI-driven customer experience automation.” Translation: half its recurring revenue now comes from teaching bots to replace call center drones. Investors didn’t care. The stock’s been a slow bleed, even with Google, Microsoft, and Lyft on the client roster.

(Source: Yahoo Finance) 

As for Thoma Bravo, this just adds to their laundry list of other enterprise software companies they’ve been snorting. Case in point: Earlier this month they dropped $12.3 billion on HR software maker Dayforce… so Verint’s $2B is pocket change by comparison. However, it slots neatly into Bravo’s existing portfolio company Calabrio, where together, they’ll stitch up one of the biggest AI-powered “customer experience” platforms in the industry. Translation: That’s private equity gold… cost-cut, consolidate, and own the rails for how companies interact with customers without having to hire actual people.

But again, this is Thoma Bravo’s entire playbook to a T. They buy mid-cap enterprise software at a premium, strip the reporting burden, mash it together with an existing asset, and sell the “platform” story. Investors on the outside never see the sausage being made, but inside? It’s recurring revenue with a “digital transformation” label slapped on it.So, while public markets saw a company worth $1.2B last week… Thoma Bravo saw a $2B platform even after it wrings the fat out. And in a few years, someone else will pay $4B for it because that’s how the cycle works.

(Source: Giphy) 

 Meaning, for Verint shareholders, the trade’s done. Collect your 18% premium and move on. For software investors, the signal is louder: private equity is still the buyer of last resort for undervalued enterprise tech. Public markets won’t pay for “AI call center automation.” But Thoma Bravo will. Which, if you’re sitting on $184 billion in dry powder, and you know turning customer complaints into predictable cash flow is legit… why the hell not? It’s not sexy, but it prints… and that’s all that matters. Until next time, friends…

At the time of publishing, Stocks.News does not hold positions in companies mentioned in the article.