{"id":90475,"date":"2019-03-26T19:33:16","date_gmt":"2019-03-26T23:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rbachnet.wwwmi3-ss40.a2hosted.com\/index.php\/"},"modified":"2021-07-24T13:23:54","modified_gmt":"2021-07-24T17:23:54","slug":"avaya-lbo-buzz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rbach.net\/index.php\/avaya-lbo-buzz\/","title":{"rendered":"Avaya LBO Buzz"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>Avaya<\/strong> is back in the news. Followers of the Bach Seat<\/a> will recall<\/a> that Avaya declared bankruptcy<\/strong> in 2017. Now the buzz<\/a> is that Santa Clara, California-based telecommunications equipment and software firm is considering a leverag<\/strong>ed buyout offer<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Avaya<\/a>Reports are circulating that Avaya’s<\/a> (AVYA<\/a>) board of directors is evaluating an offer from an unnamed private equity firm<\/strong>. Reportedly the offer values the Lucent spinoff at more than $20 per share<\/strong>, people in the know told Reuters. The private equity firm values Avaya at more than $5 billion, including $3.2 billion in debt.<\/p>\n

Avaya is one of the world\u2019s largest providers of telephony systems<\/strong>. It was spun off from Lucent Technologies<\/a> Inc in 2000, which used to be part of AT&T<\/a> (T<\/a>). The LBO comes 15 months after Avaya emerged from bankruptcy protection<\/strong>, with a $8.3 billion debt legacy from a previous leveraged buyout by private equity firms TPG Capital and Silver Lake in 2007<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"unifiedAvaya has tried to shift its revenue model to focus on cloud-based<\/strong> communications solutions with recurring software and subscriptions<\/strong> fees and not its traditional hardware business. Its legacy business is becoming more commoditized and dated. Much of Avaya’s new focus involves cloud services like unified communications as a service (UCaaS<\/strong><\/a>) and Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS<\/a>). A new Device as a Service (DaaS<\/a>) offering has also surfaced.<\/p>\n

Avaya\u2019s contact center<\/strong> business has also attracted acquisition interest<\/strong> in the past from private equity firms<\/strong>, including Clayton Dubilier & Rice LLC,<\/a> Hellman & Friedman LLC<\/a>, and Permira Advisers LLP<\/a>. Hellman & Friedman and Permira own Genesys<\/a> an Avaya competitor.<\/p>\n

As of September 2018, Avaya had about 8,100 employees worldwide, including 2,800 in the U.S.<\/p>\n

Private equity firms have recently focused on communications businesses. Among those companies are Aspect Software<\/a>, Mitel<\/a>,\u00a0 and PGi<\/a>, each privately held by such firms. Note, too, that Polycom<\/a> had been a Siris Capital property until its recent acquisition by Plantronics<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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