Frankfurt: Deutsche Boerse AG, the stock exchange operator seeking to boost growth after a failed merger, is close to taking a minority stake in big data company Trifacta Inc, according to people familiar with the matter.
The transaction by Deutsche Boerse’s venture capital arm may be announced as soon as Thursday, the people said, declining to be identified because the information is private. It’s not clear how big the investment is and where it values the company.
Trifacta, which is based in San Francisco, helps clients including Deutsche Boerse transform raw data into structured formats for analysis. In February last year, it raised $35 million (Dh128.4 million) in fresh capital from existing investors Accel Partners, Greylock Partners, Ignition Partners and a new investor, Cathay Innovation. The funding brought the company’s total amount raised to more than $76 million. Infosys Ltd, the iconic Indian outsourcing company, is also a backer.
Deutsche Boerse’s investment is part of a broader initiative to strengthen growth after its planned multibillion merger with the London Stock Exchange Group Plc collapsed earlier this year. The German company earlier this month co-led a funding round in RegTek. Solutions Inc, a regulatory reporting software provider, and in July disclosed it will invest $10 million for a minority stake in Trumid, a financial technology company that provides an electronic trading network for corporate bonds.
Data driven solutions
Trifacta last month announced that Deutsche Boerse had implemented its Trifacta Wrangler Enterprises service. Konrad Sippel, head of Deutsche Boerse’s Content Lab, said at the time the move will help his company develop and implement data driven solutions for risk management, investment decision making and trading analytics.
The exchange operator and its Chief Executive Officer Carsten Kengeter have come under fire after German authorities looked into whether the CEO traded on non-public information. Frankfurt prosecutors have offered to settle for a fine of €10.5 million against Deutsche Boerse and €500,000 for Kengeter, but Germany’s financial watchdog Bafin is said to oppose the deal as too lenient.
