Amdocs Acquires Bridgewater Systems

Amdocs, the provider of customer experience systems, has announced that it has completed the acquisition of Bridgewater Systems Corporation, a publicly held provider of policy management and network control solutions. Amdocs acquired 25,178,827 common shares of Bridgewater (representing 100 percent of Bridgewater’s outstanding common shares) for CAD$8.20 per share in cash, through a wholly owned, indirect subsidiary of Amdocs. Prior to the acquisition, Amdocs did not own any securities of Bridgewater. The transaction is valued at approximately CAD$211 million, or CAD$139 million net of Bridgewater’s cash as of June 30, 2011. The acquisition will further expand Amdocs’ Customer Experience Systems (CES) portfolio, allowing service providers to implement new value-based data monetisation strategies to capitalise on the data explosion.

In order to better monetise their networks and data services, service providers are moving away from unlimited data packages which render the network vulnerable to heavy usage in some cases. Instead, they want to create new value-based pricing and data monetisation models in which customers will be offered personalised packages that better match revenue to their consumption behavior and usage patterns.

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“This strategic acquisition will enable service providers to completely redefine the real-time data experience and maximise the return on their network investments,” said Brian Shepherd, group president for Amdocs. “We are delighted to welcome Bridgewater’s highly innovative, skilled professionals to Amdocs as we continue expanding our market-leading CES portfolio.”

“Following this acquisition, service providers will be able to benefit from data experience solutions based on a pre-integrated combination of Amdocs’ leading convergent charging technology and Bridgewater’s advanced policy control capabilities that address the increase in demand for high-bandwidth services and the exponential growth of smartphones and other connected devices,” said Ed Ogonek, President and CEO for Bridgewater.

Amdocs does not expect a material impact from the acquisition of Bridgewater on fiscal year 2011 or fiscal year 2012 non-GAAP earnings per share, which excludes acquisition related costs and equity-based compensation expense, net of related tax effects. The impact on GAAP results will be finalised after Amdocs completes the purchase price accounting for the acquisition. Amdocs may incur acquisition-related expense in fiscal 2011 to account for certain costs related to the acquisition. In addition to the product and solution synergies, Amdocs and Bridgewater also share numerous top-tier customers, including Bell Mobility, Sprint and Telstra.