Cloud telephony company Exotel and contact centre software provider Ameyo have entered into a definitive agreement for a merger, as the two firms look to join forces to address the fast-growing market for cloud-based contact centre services.
The two companies said that their combined offering will address the needs of most large contact centre customers in emerging markets, who want to shift immediately to the cloud-based offerings due to fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic.
The undisclosed deal will see investors representing 80% of shareholding in Ameyo exiting in cash, while CEO Sachin Bhatia and other ESOP holders in the company will get a stake in Exotel. The deal is expected to complete in 6-9 months via NCLT merger.
“Post Covid (lockdowns), we noticed that the pace at which customers wanted to adopt the cloud had really gone through the roof,” said Shivakumar Ganesan, co-founder and CEO at Exotel. “Exotel was in the process of building it out slowly, but then we figured out that we have fallen behind market requirements and Ameyo was going through a similar thing as well.”
Exotel said it has raised a mix of equity and debt from A91 Partners, Blume Ventures, Alteria Capital and Stride Ventures, along with cash the company had accrued to fund the cash exit of Ameyo’s other founders and investors.
While Bhatia will remain the CEO of Ameyo, his co-founders Bishal Lachhiramka and Nayan Jain along with investors Forum Synergies will exit the company.
Ameyo and Exotel will also continue offering their solutions in the market as is, but will create a new offering to help contact centre customers move their entire operations to the cloud. Ganesan said that the product will use Exotel’s cloud telephony platform in the back end with Ameyo’s software.
“Nobody has this kind of scale and features that the combined entity has today. That sets us on the growth trajectory and helps compete with the new global entrants. We are the incumbents and the leaders and we want to maintain this position,” said Ameyo’s Bhatia, who will also get a seat on Exotel’s board.
Exotel had announced raising Rs 45 crore in funding from A91 Partners and Blume Ventures earlier this month, which came just six months after the company raised Rs 40 crore from investors. Prior to this, the nearly decade-old company had been bootstrapped and was profitable.
The companies said that their combined annual recurring revenue (ARR) was around $40 million, with 70-75% of that coming from India, making them the biggest B2B SaaS provider in the country.
Further, Exotel and Ameyo said they service 500 of India’s largest companies and will now have a presence in over 60 countries.
Indigoedge and Zanskar were the advisers to Exotel and Ameyo respectively on the merger.
Source: Economic Times