Silver Lake to merge Cegid and Silae in €10bn deal

Silver Lake has announced plans to merge two of its majority-owned French companies, Cegid and Silae, in a deal expected to value the combined entity at more than €10 billion in enterprise value. The merger aims to create a major European technology platform specializing in accounting, tax, payroll, human resources, and digital financial services.

Cegid provides cloud business management software for small and medium-sized enterprises and accountants, while Silae specializes in payroll and HR solutions. Together, the companies serve approximately 2 million end-customers and over 15,000 chartered accountancy firms. The combined group will produce more than 13 million payslips across Europe every month.

The strategic goal of the merger is to provide a more integrated platform by connecting Cegid’s accounting and tax software with Silae’s payroll capabilities and the digital finance services of Shine, a business Cegid recently acquired. The companies intend to use the combined resources to increase research and development investment, leveraging a team of approximately 1,400 developers to automate administrative tasks through AI and support the adoption of new e-invoicing requirements.