The Carlyle Group Partners with management to acquire Unison from Abry Partners

Submitted 30/06/2020 - 10:17am

Unison, a provider of procurement, supply chain, and contract management software to Federal government agencies and government contractors, has been acquired by global investment firm The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG), and Unison management. 

Terms of the transaction have not been disclosed. Carlyle previously owned the business from 2005 to 2010. 

 
Unison’s solutions help government agencies and contractors navigate the complex rules and compliance requirements of procurement and grants, program management and contract lifecycle management. All of Unison’s solutions are available via the cloud, allowing clients to implement solutions quickly, efficiently, and inexpensively.
 
“We are pleased to re-join the Carlyle portfolio of companies to help craft the next chapter of Unison’s growth,” says Reid Jackson, President and CEO of Unison. “The Carlyle team shares our consistent focus on the success of our clients as the foundation of our business. With Carlyle’s support, we will accelerate our focus on bringing ’Applied Innovation‘ to powering the business of government and their vendor partners.”
 
Mike Gozycki, Carlyle Managing Director, adds: “We’re excited to partner again with Reid Jackson and the Unison management team, who we have known for more than 15 years. The Unison team has done an incredible job developing solutions that are tailored for the Federal market and helping their customers navigate highly complex and constantly evolving regulations. We are eager to support management’s plans to continue investing in their market-leading software solutions and the company’s mission of enabling customer success.”
 
Patrick McCarter, Carlyle Managing Director and Head of Carlyle’s Global Technology, Software and Business Services team, says: “Our partnership with Unison represents Carlyle’s long history of investing in leading industry-specific application software companies. We look forward to leveraging our global platform and industry expertise to support Unison in its continued growth.”
 
Carlyle’s wide-breadth of experience investing in leading industry-specific application software companies include Gemcom, serving the mining sector; ION Investment Group and SS&C, serving the financial services sector; MetroLogic, serving the aerospace and automotive sectors; Net Health, serving the healthcare sector; OpenLink Financial and Quorum Software, serving the energy sector; RMI, serving the rail sector; and Accelerate Learning and SchoolNet, serving the education sector.
 
Equity capital for the investment came from Carlyle Partners VII, an USD18.5 billion fund that makes majority and strategic minority investments primarily in the US in targeted industries, including in technology, media and telecommunications (TMT) companies. TMT is a core area of focus for Carlyle, representing more than USD30 billion of invested equity since inception. Other recent technology investments include ZoomInfo (NASDAQ: ZI), a leading provider of sales and marketing intelligence software solutions; and HireVue, a leading provider of talent acquisition software solutions. 
 
Kirkland & Ellis provided legal advisory services to Unison and Abry Partners. Latham & Watkins provided legal advisory services and PwC provided financial advisory services to Carlyle.

Tags Deals & Transactions Acquisitions