March 19, 2024 at 10:45AM
Atos’ shares plunged by over 21% after Airbus decided not to proceed with acquiring its cybersecurity business, part of Atos’ debt repayment strategy. This is the second recent deal to collapse for Atos. The company is now assessing alternative options. Airbus’ interest in Atos’ cybersecurity unit emerged in 2022, with a bid for a 30% stake in Evidian, which includes BDS and Atos’ cloud computing business.
The meeting notes indicate that Atos shares plummeted by over 21% after Airbus decided not to proceed with discussions regarding the acquisition of Atos’ cybersecurity business. Atos had previously announced the potential sale of its Big Data and Security (BDS) business to Airbus for a valuation between €1.5 billion and €1.8 billion. However, after the market update on Tuesday, Atos declared the end of negotiations with Airbus concerning the cybersecurity unit.
In response, Atos is actively evaluating strategic alternatives considering the sovereign imperatives of the French state. This development has led to the rescheduling of the 2023 earnings release to assess the strategic options. Additionally, the notes mention that this is the second deal to fall through for Atos recently, following the unsuccessful attempts to sell its legacy managed infrastructure services business.
The meeting notes also highlight previous unsuccessful dealings with Airbus related to Atos’ Evidian security business in 2022 and mention other cybersecurity M&A activities in the industry, such as Cisco’s acquisition of Splunk and ZeroFox being taken private in a $350 million deal.
Overall, Atos faces significant setbacks with its proposed deals and is now in the process of evaluating strategic alternatives for the cybersecurity business in light of these developments.