Bango Plc / NHN Corporation

Cavendish Corporate Finance (“Cavendish”), the UK’s leading sell-side specialist M&A firm and part of finnCap Group, has advised Bango plc (“Bango”) on strategic investments from South Korean online technology conglomerate NHN Corporation (“NHN”).

The transactions see NHN make a majority investment in Bango Deep, the holding company for the Audiens Customer Data Platform business, and make a separate strategic minority investment directly into Bango plc via a subscription of new shares.

Audiens, which was acquired by mobile commerce company Bango in 2018, offers customers a simple-to-use yet technologically sophisticated Customer Data Platform that enables brands of all sizes to plan, execute and analyse their online marketing activities.

The strategic investments allow Audiens to leverage NHN’s in-depth data science and technology know-how to enrich its product suite on a global basis, whilst also facilitating the expansion of NHN’s channel to global customers beyond South Korea.

The transactions followed a focused process run by Cavendish to review strategic options for the Audiens business and showcases finnCap Group’s end-to-end solution given close collaboration between the Cavendish M&A and finnCap public markets teams.

The Cavendish team was led by Jon Edirmanasinghe, Partner and Chris Malcolm, Director with the finnCap team being led by Marc Milmo, Director.

Jon Edirmanasinghe, Partner commented:

“The investments into both Bango Deep and Bango plc represent a transformational expansion of the partnership with NHN which will provide wider collaboration opportunities between the companies.

The transactions demonstrate our tech sector expertise, our ability to complete complex cross-border transactions and our ability to complete transactions in difficult macro-economic environments.”

Ray Anderson, Executive Chairman at Bango plc commented:

“NHN has a fantastic growth story and a history of first-mover innovation which, coupled with the existing data platform know-how at Audiens, will enable us to create a powerful force for technology leadership in online commerce.”

JS Lee, Director at NHN Corp commented:

“Together we will create a global leader in data technology. The NHN strategy is to partner with global leaders to take our research and technology to the world. We are privileged to enter into this strategic partnership with Bango, which has built a unique position at the heart of global mobile commerce for the 21st century.”

About Bango

App developers, stores and payment providers cross the threshold into the Bango ecosystem to converge, grow and thrive. By bringing businesses together and powering e-commerce with unique data-driven insights, Bango delivers new business opportunities and new dimensions of growth for customers around the world. Being inside the Bango circle means global merchants including Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) can work together with payment partners from Africa to the Americas, accelerating the performance of everyone on the inside.

About NHN

NHN headquartered in Seoul, South Korea, operates a wide range of businesses which include financial technology, data and advertising technology, entertainment content and cloud services.

Founded in 1999, it rapidly became a market leader mobile gaming and entertainment. NHN then launched domestic and international payment solutions for both online and retail ecommerce, which has expanded across Asia and into North America. Based on a vast and growing user behaviour database, and expertise in user analysis and data modelling, NHN has expanded into data technology and mobile marketing products.

“The Arculus founders have very much enjoyed working closely with the Cavendish team throughout this process. Their understanding of the technology services and cyber security sector enabled us to showcase our business in the best possible light. Their insightful guidance was a constant and we were highly impressed with the team’s capabilities and commitment which were instrumental in delivering the outcome we wanted.”

Austin France, Co-Founder at Arculus

“We are thrilled to join Motorola Solutions and build upon their industry-leading portfolio and continue to support our customers in the most challenging of environments. I would like to express our gratitude to Anthony and the team at Cavendish who provided invaluable counsel and a streamlined process throughout.”

Paul Elsey, Managing Director at Silent Sentinel

“In July 2015 we founded Pure Cremation and have grown the business to become the largest independent provider of prepaid plans in the UK. Pure is only part way through its exciting journey and, after a rigorous search process, we are delighted to have found such a strong partner in Epiris.

The Cavendish team, led by Jonathan Buxton and Ben Goldring, did a fantastic job, running a truly competitive process and managing the transaction with great skill. They were crucial in delivering this deal and its successful outcome – many thanks to the whole team.”

Bryan Powell and Catherine Powell, Co-Founders of Pure Cremation

Time is the most valuable commodity of any entrepreneur, and Zuleika and the team at finnCap have been exceptional in helping us secure today’s investment whilst enabling us to also focus time and effort on growing the business. This marks the latest milestone on our journey but it’s by no means our final destination, we are here to help people fall in love with taking the train again, and enable operators to run more profitable networks full of happier, less stressed passengers – it’s long overdue .”

Iain Griffin, Co-founder and CEO of Seatfrog

“We are absolutely delighted with the outcome of this deal and are excited to be joining DNV. This strategic decision will enable us to further accelerate our long-term growth objectives and showcase our unique LUNA technology. Karri and Harry have achieved an outstanding result for us through their wealth of sector expertise and highly commercial advice and it has been a joy working with them.”

Barry Mulholland, Founding Partner at MBI

“We engaged with finnCap Cavendish over 18 months ago to help us prepare for sale. The team’s sector specialist advice and guidance, combined with astute management of every aspect of the transaction process, delivered an exceptional deal that has surpassed all expectation, our shareholders are delighted”.

Rupert Emson, Co-founder-CEO, Vero Screening

“We’re excited to join Dialogue and to bring our digital well-being and market-leading health engagement together with their diagnosis and treatment capabilities.

I’d also like to thank to the finnCap Cavendish team for being an exceptional partner during this process. Mike and the team provided us with excellent advice and guidance throughout, working tirelessly to ensure the best outcome possible was delivered. As a founder, I couldn’t recommend them highly enough.”

Martin Blinder, co-founder & CEO, TicTrac

“This is an important milestone for our business, allowing us to focus on developing our mobile payments solutions. We believe Boku Identity will be able to continue to develop under Twilio’s ownership and we wish the business and its staff well for the future. We were impressed with the resilience and creativity of the team at finnCap Cavendish and are grateful to them for advising on the deal.”

Jon Prideaux, CEO, Boku

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Stuart Rowe, CEO, MailManager

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Scott Cunningham, CFO, iomart Group plc