Ebix, Inc., a leading international supplier of On-Demand software and e-commerce services to the insurance, financial, healthcare and e-learning industries has acquired India based Indus Software Technologies Pvt. Ltd., a global provider of enterprise Lending software solutions to financial institutions, captive auto finance and telecom companies, for approximately $29 million including $5 million of contingent earn out.
Indus will be tightly integrated into Ebix’s Financial Exchange EbixCash offering in India and abroad, with key Indus business executives becoming an integral part of the combined EbixCash senior leadership. The acquisition of Indus will increase the employee strength of Ebix in India by 900 to approximately 7,200 employees.
In the financial year 2017, Indus had revenues of $22 million and EBITDA of approximately 17%. Ebix believes that the business can continue to grow at the rate of 12% to 15% plus annually with operating margins of 30% or more, once fully integrated. Ebix expects the acquisition to be immediately accretive to its earnings and forecasts $0.19 in increased Diluted EPS, once the acquisition is fully integrated over the next 6 months.
Ebix funded the acquisition using its internal cash reserves and did not use any investment bankers for the transaction. KeyBanc Capital Markets Inc. served as the exclusive financial advisors to Indus Software and its principal owners Black Dragon Capital.
Founded in 1990, Indus offers a specialized suite of products and technology solutions for Banking & Finance, Telecom and Insurance Industries. With more than 150 enterprise lending implementations in 15 languages across 50 plus countries, Indus derives 56% of its revenues from India and the balance coming primarily from Europe, Middle East and South-East Asia.
With enterprise solutions that are designed for international markets with multi-currency, multi-lingual and multi-organizational support, Indus technology today forms the backbone lending engine for over 100 banking and finance, captive auto finance, telecom and insurance companies globally. Indus today has an impressive base of global blue-chip customers and partners
- Banking and Finance clients include leading names like Standard Chartered Bank, Societe Generale, Canara Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Doha Bank, United Arab Bank, Dubai First Bank, IDFC Bank, Thanachart Insurance and FMB etc.
- Captive Auto Finance clients like Isuzu Leasing, Volvo, Toyota Financial Services, BMW, Nissan, Volkswagen and HeroFinCorp. etc.
- Insurance clients like HDFC Life, Kotak Life insurance and Exide Life insurance etc.
- Telecom clients like Idea, Airtel, Maxis, Aircel, Viva and Ooredo etc.
Indus solutions tend to form the backbone of Enterprise loan life cycle management for a Lender with modules that encompass retail and corporate origination, loan management and collections for areas as diverse as auto, mortgage, credit card, personal loans, education loans, consumer loans and Gold loans etc. The Company’s solution set includes functionalities like Commissions & Incentives, Workflow management, Mobility, Lead management, Collateral management, Dealer Funding etc. besides its end-to-end Lending suite. Built on modern J2EE database independent architecture that can easily be ported to any handheld device, Indus solutions can be implemented as an integrated end-to-end solution or as independent modules capable of interfacing with legacy or existing host systems.
Robin Raina, Ebix Chairman, President & said
We have always believed that Lending is a must have functionality for any leading end-to-end Financial Exchange. Accordingly, in our vision plan for EbixCash with respect to the area of Lending, we see three opportunities – powering the technology for Lenders in any industry; creating a person-to person lending exchange that can be available over the web, e-wallets, mobile phones, white label Corporate intranets and EbixCash outlets to consumers; lending services for our EbixCash outlets that allows them the power to borrow and expand their business with EbixCash. The acquisition of Indus is a step in the direction of accomplishing the first step of that vision plan.
Indus provides us now with the ability to interface a Person to Person (P2P) Lending exchange into the back-end systems of top lenders in the market place and move data seamlessly across front-end and back-end systems. This will also allow Indus clients to access the 260,000+ physical distribution expanse of EbixCash, along with our strong corporate and electronic network, and be a lending provider to our vast consumer network in India, through a future EbixCash P2P Exchange. Indus also fits in well with our goals of expanding the EbixCash network globally, since it provides us with an international customer base across Europe, Middle East and South-East Asia.
Louis Hernandez Jr., Founder, Managing Director & CEO – Black Dragon Capital, said
We are very proud of the work we have done with the Indus team to create a high-growth and profitable company that is a perfect fit for Ebix’s performance driven and growth culture. Ebix is acquiring outstanding talent and a clear market leader with a global brand and distribution, that will help further its growth while adding to Ebix’s comprehensive product suite. It’s great for the customers, employees and partners at Indus and is very exciting for everybody. Overall, Black Dragon Capital accomplished what it does best, which is to help a company accelerate its growth.
Leadership in India’s Financial Exchange markets
The addition of the Indus to the EbixCash portfolio further strengthens Ebix’s leadership in India’s Financial Exchange markets
- EbixCash already has a dominant leadership position in the inward remittance exchange arena in India.
- EbixCash is already the largest domestic remittance exchange in India with domestic remittance volume of approximately $100 million per month.
- EbixCash is seen as a leader in the outward remittance and Forex markets, with Forex counters in 25 international airports, besides a vast network encompassing 165 outlets spread across 55 cities, 200+ franchisee partners, 2,000+ travel agents, 50+ banks and financial institutions, 1000+ SMEs, and 150+large corporate clients.
- EbixCash through its travel portal Via.com is one of South East Asia’s leading travel exchanges with over 110,000 distribution outlets and 8000 corporate clients, processing over 24.5 million transactions every year.
- EbixCash is also a recognized leader in prepaid cards, domestic remittances and bill payments, processing approximately 600,000 transactions per day and approximately $2 Billion in annual payment volume.
- EbixCash is already recognized as a leader in the Gift card space with brand gift cards across all categories with 100+ Brand co-partners like Amazon, Flipkart.com, Croma, Lifestyle, Big Bazaar, Tanishq, BookMyShow.com, Reliance Digital, MakeMyTrip, Café Coffee Day, Pizza Hut, Myntra, Pantaloon etc.
- EbixCash is a leader in the utility payment space serving as a payment exchange for large utility providers like BSES, Tata Power, NDPL, Reliance Energy and Mahanagar Gas etc.
- Ebix’s recent joint venture initiative with Bombay Stock Exchange positions it as a gateway for insurance carriers to sell insurance to India’s vast population through EbixCash’s tens of thousands of phygital outlets across the country, besides BSE’s strong network across the country.