Geac buys Comshare for $52 million

See correction below

Business management software company Geac Computer is to buy Comshare in a move that it hopes will revitalize its business.

Comshare of Ann Arbor, Mich., develops financial planning, budgeting and forecasting software aimed at a similar customer base to Geac’s own software, Geac said in a statement Monday. Cross-selling of the two product ranges will add about 12 percent to Geac’s annual revenue, it said.

Charles Homs, enterprise application analyst with Forrester Research, in Amsterdam, said Monday that he isn’t surprised by the acquisition “because that’s the kind of company Geac are, they acquire a lot of companies. They don’t necessarily do a lot with them afterwards; they typically buy companies for their maintenance revenue.”

However, in this case, it is possible that Geac does feel it needs Comshare’s software to add to its portfolio, he said “I do know they have a fairly incomplete set of applications.”

The $52 million deal is expected to be complete by August, Geac of Markham, Ontario, said.

Neither Geac nor Comshare was immediately available for comment.

Correction

In this article, Geac’s target market and Comshare’s headquarters were originally incorrect.