Sale process for a stake or for 100% of the information technology platform of Montepaschi bank is on again. The platform, which has estimated sales of 350 million euros, is to be spinned off in a newco. The decision by Mps was announced at the beginning of this year but later the process seemed to have been put in a stand-by mode (see here a previous post by BeBeez).
However now PwC is said to have received a mandate to coordinate the sale, Il Sole 24 Ore wrote, adding that ready to put forward an offer is Cedacri, an IT company providing services to Italian banks which is owned by a group of small and medium size banks and, with a 27% stake, by the FSI Mid-Market Growth Equity Fund managed by FSI sgr. The fund actually bought its stake at the beginning of this year with the aim to transform Cedacri in a building up platform for the sector in Italy (see here a previous post by BeBeez). Back then rumors were that potential targets for an m&a campaign might be both the IT platform of Mps and CSE, a competitor of Cedacri also owned by a group of Italian banks, with revenues of 164 million euros in 2016.
