French IT consulting group Atos SE and U.S. rival DXC Technology Co said on Tuesday they have decided to discontinue talks about a potential acquisition.
Reuters reported in January, citing sources, that Atos made a formal approach valuing New-York listed DXC at more than $10 billion including debt, in what would have been the deal-hungry IT consulting group’s biggest ever acquisition.
Atos confirmed last month it made an approach to DXC.
“After sharing certain high-level information in order to help Atos understand why the board believes the proposal undervalued DXC, Atos and DXC today agreed to discontinue further discussions,” DXC said.
Atos issued a separate statement to say its board of directors had made a unanimous decision to end the talks.
DXC, founded in 2017 when Hewlett Packard Enterprise spun-off its enterprise services business, has been grappling with rising debt, with boss Mike Salvino taking the helm in 2019 and subsequently announcing a strategic review of non-core assets.
Atos spent $3.4 billion to buy Michigan-based IT services provider Syntel in a cash deal in 2018, its biggest deal ever.
Atos is now looking to take advantage of investor appetite for pandemic-resilient technology assets to clinch a deal that would be in the region of its own market value of 8.2 billion euros ($10.1 billion), Reuters reported last month, citing sources.
Source: Reuters.com