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Axway Software

Axway Software – An American IT Company That Originally Emerged As A Part Of A French Conglomerate.

Axway Software is an American IT company founded twenty years ago. It is a publicly-traded company with its headquarters based in Phoenix, Arizona, US. There are more than 1,800 employees in the company serving approximately 11,000 customers who are spread across 100 countries. Axway, apart from America, has offices in various parts of Europe (Lyon, Paris, Bulgaria, etc) and support centers in India. Since Axway was originally a part of a French software company, Sopra Steria, the company has another headquarter in Puteaux, Paris. Axway was spun-off from Sopra as a subsidiary in 2000. The company has come a long way from there as once from Europe it built a vast business in the lands of America.

About Axway Software

Axway Software is known for providing software tools for various applications. Some of them are enterprise software, business analytics, and activity monitoring, mobile application development, API management, etc. Last year, Axway Software was recognized as a Leader in the 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Full Life Cycle API Management for the sixth time. Axway, in twenty years, has filed more than 100 patents in technology innovation.

In 2011, the company was listed in the Compartment B of Euronext Paris meaning it had market capitalization between €150 million and €1 billion. The company is also named a leader in the Forrester Wave for API Management Solutions Q3 2020. Though API offers several products, its Amplify API Management Platform is the main product and the company has received several recognitions for the same. Other products are Axway B2B Integration, Axway Managed File Transfer, and Specialized Products for supply chains and other purposes.

Axway Software
Image source: thalesgroup.com

Major Events in the History

Axway was officially incorporated as an individual company on December 28, 2000. The company was originally the software infrastructure division of Sopra, a French IT company. But, Sopra decided to spun-off the division as an individual entity (a subsidiary of the company). After the spin-off, Sopra used Axway Software as a means for expanding into the Enterprise Application Integration market. Right after Axway was incorporated it started to make multiple acquisitions from the early 2000s. In 2002, Axway acquired a Swedish company called Viewlocity.

The series of acquisitions continued and in January 2006 Axway acquired US company Cyclone Commerce after which a huge part of the executive management team and the operations moved to Phoenix. Next year in February, Axway acquired Atos’s B2B software business in Germany and Tumbleweed Communications, a US-based company in 2008. In 2011, Axway Software detached itself completed from the Sopra Group and was listed in the Paris Euronext. Some of the companies acquired in the next few years are Vordel, an Irish company, SCI Soluções, a Brazilian company, assets of Information Gateway in Australia, and a French company called Systar. The company went public in 2011 and since then both its annual revenue and profit have increased steadily. But, recently, the company’s growth hasn’t been very impressive and its stock has declined by 22% in the past few months.

In 2015, Christophe Fabre stepped down from the position of CEO of the company which he was holding from 2005. Axway acquired many more companies in the recent year starting with Appcelerator, a US-based mobile technology company whose main product is Titanium, an open-source platform for mobile app development. In 2017, Axway acquired another US company called Syncplicity, a company that develops solutions for sharing and synchronization of files. Though Axway Software operates as an independent entity, Sopra Steria acquired an 8.62% stake in the company in 2006.

Patrick Donovan – CEO of Axway Software

Patrick Donovan is the CEO of the company since 2018 and he replaced Jean-Marc Lazzari for the position. Before becoming the CEO of Axway Software, he served as the CFO of the same company. Donovan being an American citizen has spent several years in France which gave him a good idea about both the American and French scenario of Axway. Donovan mainly oversees the company’s financial and legal functions and has in-depth knowledge about the business model of Axway.

Bloomberg L.P.

Bloomberg L.P. – One Of The Most Famous Companies In The Mass Media Industry.

Founded in 1981, Bloomberg L.P. is one of the most renowned media companies based in Manhattan, New York City. The company is famous for offering financial software tools, enterprise applications, and news to various financial organizations. Bloomberg L.P. offers these services to various companies through the Bloomberg Terminal which is the core revenue-generating platform of the company. Currently, the company has established offices in 167 different locations and has nearly 20,000 employees. BloombergL.P. is a private company and there is a limited partnership.

About the Company

In 1981, Michael Bloomberg with help from Thomas Secunda, Duncan MacMillan, and Charles Zegar founded Bloomberg L.P. Apart from these four founders, Merrill Lynch invested in the company (12% ownership investment). Bloomberg has multiple services and products that include Bloomberg Terminal, Bloomberg News (wire service), Bloomberg Television (a global television network), Bloomberg Radio, magazines, and newsletters. The revenue generated by Bloomberg has crossed the $10 billion mark (in 2019). The company is currently under the leadership of Michael Bloomberg (co-founder and CEO).

Bloomberg L.P.
Image source: prnewswire.com

History of Bloomberg L.P.

The major contribution behind establishing Company as an independent company goes to Michael Bloomberg. Back in 1981, when Salomon Brothers, a huge American international bank was acquired, Michael Bloomberg received settlement money of $10 million. Before the acquisition of Salomon Brothers, the bank used Bloomberg as the computerized financial system. The company was designed in-house and when Michael received $10 million he used that money to start Innovative Market Systems (IMS).

Michael decided to develop his own computerized system that will provide real-time market data and various financial analytics to the Wall Street firms. In 1982, Michael released the Market Master Terminal (later known as the Bloomberg Terminal) into the market and Merrill Lynch became its first customer. Merrill Lynch made a deal with the company that on behalf of buying 20 terminals and a 30% equity stake for $30 million Bloomberg won’t be able to market the terminal to any of Merrill Lynch’s competitors for the next five years.

In 1986, the name of the company was changed to Bloomberg L.P. (Limited Partnership) and in the upcoming years launched other products like Bloomberg News and Bloomberg Terminal Subscription. In 1993, Bloomberg.com was first launched to provide information on markets, currency conversion, the latest news, and events in the financial sector. In 1996, the company decided to acquire ⅓ of the stake owned by Merrill Lynch for $200 million. This acquisition valued the company at $2 billion. During the financial crisis, Merrill Lynch decided to sell the remaining stake back to the company and it valued Bloomberg at $22.5 billion approximately.

Since 1981, the company has made several acquisitions ranging from magazines to software companies. In 1992, the company purchased New York Radio Station WNEW for $13.5 million. It was later renamed Bloomberg Radio. In 2009, a weekly business magazine from McGraw-Hill called BusinessWeek. This magazine was relaunched as Bloomberg Businessweek and this acquisition was done to bring general business to the media audiences.

Major Acquisitions

The same year, the company also purchased New Energy Finance, a data company based in the UK. This acquisition was done so that company becomes an industry source with abundant information to support low-carbon energy development. Some of the other companies acquired by Bloomberg are Arlington (Bureau of National Affairs based in Virginia), Dublin-based software company PolarLake, Barclays indices business, and CityLab.

Michael Bloomberg – CEO and Co-Founder

Michael Bloomberg, mostly famous as Mike Bloomberg, is a famous American businessman and politician. He is the co-founder and also the majority owner of the company. Michael went to John Hopkins University as graduated as an electrical engineer in 1964. Later he went to Harvard Business School and acquired his MBA degree. Michael was a general partner at the Salomon Brothers upon acquisition of which led Michael to establish his company. Currently, Mike Bloomberg is among the top 20 billionaires in the Forbes billionaires list.