SOUTH PORTLAND, Maine--(BUSINESS WIRE)--WEX Inc. (NYSE: WEX), a leading provider of corporate payment solutions, today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Benaissance, a leading provider of integrated software-as-a-service (SaaS) technologies and services for healthcare premium billing, payment and workflow management, for total consideration of $80 million. WEX expects the acquisition to be slightly accretive in 2016, excluding one-time integration costs.
The transaction, which has been approved by the boards of directors of both companies, is subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. It is anticipated that the transaction will close in the fourth quarter of 2015.
Melissa Smith, WEX’s president and chief executive officer stated, “The acquisition of Benaissance builds on the success we have already had in the healthcare space by allowing us to provide an expanded and differentiated payments solution. We believe this will enhance our addressable market opportunity, customer loyalty and wallet share over time, while strengthening our overall value proposition in this attractive, high-growth vertical.”
Since its founding in 2006, Benaissance has revolutionized premium billing and payment acceptance practices through two industry-leading SaaS solutions. This includes ExchangePoint℠, which addresses the complex financial management demands of public and private health insurance exchanges for employers and individuals as well as COBRApoint®, which addresses complex financial management, benefits administration and payment processing for individual subscribers. Benaissance’s platform offers consolidated individual and group premium billing and payments technology and services to employers and consumers via public and private exchanges, carriers and third party administrators. Upon completion of the transaction, Benaissance will be integrated with WEX’s existing Evolution1 platform. Benaissance and Evolution1 have built a successful relationship over the past decade and already share a number of mutual partners and customers.
About WEX Inc.
WEX Inc. (NYSE: WEX) is a leading provider of
corporate payment solutions. From its roots in fleet card payments
beginning in 1983, WEX has expanded the scope of its business into a
multi-channel provider of corporate payment solutions representing 9
million vehicles and offering exceptional payment security and control
across a wide spectrum of business sectors. WEX serves a global set of
customers and partners through its operations around the world, with
offices in the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, the United
Kingdom, Italy, France, Germany, Norway, and Singapore. WEX and its
subsidiaries employ more than 2,000 associates. The Company has been
publicly traded since 2005, and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange
under the ticker symbol “WEX.” For more information, visit www.wexinc.com
and follow WEX on Twitter at @WEXIncNews.
About Benaissance
Benaissance is the trusted financial
management partner for health benefits administration, and pioneered the
industry’s leading ExchangePoint℠ and COBRApoint® Software as Service
(SaaS) solutions for individual single-point and consolidated group
premium billing. Together, these two solutions deliver highly efficient,
scalable billing and payment solutions with easy-to-understand billing
and convenient payment options—for tens of thousands of US employers and
millions of American families through private exchanges, state based
marketplaces, and over 100 health plan and TPA customers.
Forward-Looking Statements
This news release contains
forward-looking statements, including statements regarding: beliefs
about the accretive nature of the transaction; the anticipated closing
date for the transaction; beliefs that the transaction will expand the
company’s addressable market opportunity, customer loyalty and wallet
share over time; and, beliefs that the transaction will strengthen the
company’s overall value proposition in the addressable market. Any
statements that are not statements of historical facts may be deemed to
be forward-looking statements. When used in this news release, the words
"may," "could," "anticipate," "plan," "continue," "project," "intend,"
"estimate," "believe," "expect" and similar expressions are intended to
identify forward-looking statements, although not all forward-looking
statements contain such words. These forward-looking statements are
subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual
results to differ materially, including: decisions and inquiries by
governmental regulatory agencies which are beyond the company’s control;
the effects of the Company’s business expansion and acquisition efforts;
the Company’s failure to successfully integrate the businesses it has
acquired; the failure of corporate investments to result in anticipated
strategic value; the impact and size of credit losses; the impact of
changes to the Company's credit standard; breaches of the Company’s
technology systems and any resulting negative impact on our reputation,
or liabilities, or loss of relationships with customers or merchants;
the Company’s failure to maintain or renew key agreements; failure to
expand the Company’s technological capabilities and service offerings as
rapidly as the Company’s competitors; the actions of regulatory bodies,
including banking, competition and securities regulators, or possible
changes in banking regulations impacting the Company’s industrial bank
and the Company as the corporate parent; changes in interest rates; the
impact of the Company’s outstanding notes on its operations; the
incurrence of impairment charges if our assessment of the fair value of
certain of our reporting units changes; the uncertainties of litigation;
as well as other risks and uncertainties identified in Item 1A of our
Annual Report for the year ended December 31, 2014, filed on Form 10-K
with the Securities and Exchange Commission on February 26, 2015. The
Company's forward-looking statements do not reflect the potential future
impact of any alliance, merger, acquisition, disposition or stock
repurchases. The forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of
this earnings release and undue reliance should not be placed on these
statements. The Company disclaims any obligation to update any
forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events
or otherwise.