Thales to boost ANZ presence with acquisition of Daltrey investor Tesserent

Thales has reached an agreement with Australian cybersecurity vendor Tesserent to acquire all of its shares, in a bid to increase the biometrics and digital identity giant’s footprint in Australia and New Zealand.

Under the binding Scheme Implementation Deed (SID), Thales would pay AU$0.13 (approximately US$0.09) per share, which gives Tesserent an AU$176 million ($119 million) valuation.

Tesserent provides a wide variety of digital security services, including penetration testing, vulnerability management and incident response services, physical access control and video security. Tesserent also owns Secure Logic, which provides digital identity services for the New South Wales mobile driver’s license, according to its LinkedIn profile.

“With the acquisition of Tesserent and its highly skilled team of cyber experts, and combined with our own system engineering experts, Thales Australia will establish an Australian/New Zealand leader in Cyber Defence able to best protect the country and its national infrastructure from cyber threats,” says Thales Australia CEO Jeff Connolly. He referred to several cybersecurity acquisitions by Thales in Europe during 2022 as well.

Tesserent also invested up to $8.7 million in Daltrey in 2021, giving it a stake in the Australian biometrics provider as high as 7 percent.

The transaction is recommended by Tesserent’s board but still requires shareholder and regulatory approval. It is expected to be completed in the second half of 2023.

Article Topics

acquisitions  |  biometrics  |  cybersecurity  |  Daltrey  |  digital identity  |  Tesserent  |  Thales