The transformation that Atos is undergoing in the last year is profound. In the middle of last year, the French ICT services giant announced that it was exploring a restructuring of the company by dividing it into two parts, which ended up causing the departure of its newly appointed CEO, Rodolphe Belmer. Despite this, the operation went ahead leading to the creation of evidence (initially called Evidian), a subsidiary comprised of Atos’ digital, security and big data business operations; and Tech Foundations, comprised of the company’s data center and hosting operations, digital workplace, and business process outsourcing.
Despite this, the financial pressure has not eased and according to what they say in Reuters, the company would be looking for a way to sell one of these two new units to EP Equity Investment, a Czech company in the energy sector, in an operation estimated at 2,000 million dollars. The French group would thus say goodbye to Tech Foundations, which would be sold for 100 million euros plus 1,900 million of the debt that weighs on this division.
For Atos, EPEI is “a recognized and financially sound European industrial conglomerate with a long-term global vision.” His CEO, Czech billionaire Daniel K?etínský, has made his fortune in the energy sector as the majority owner of Energeticky a prumyslovy holding (EPH), one of Central Europe’s largest energy groups. However, and although EPEI is of course the highest bidder, from Atos they are not closed to other possibilities and have assured that the sale will take place in any case after an in-depth review of their options.
As part of this move, the company also intends to strengthen its balance sheet by issuing €900 million of shares earmarked for Eviden shareholders and in which EPEI is also expected to obtain a 7.5% stake in Eviden as part of the transaction. If all goes well, the entire sale is expected to be completed in el fourth quarter of 2023 or in the first quarter of 2024, subject to final agreements and customary financial and regulatory conditions.
Following this divestment, the remainder of Atos is expected to be rebranded as Eviden SE, while the Tech Foundations portion will retain the Atos brand. For the rest of 2023, Atos/Eviden assures that it aims to accelerate its organic growth compared to the previous year and stated that it “has the ambition” to achieve annual growth of 7% in the period 2022-2026. Atos has also announced that Paul Saleh will join as CFO, replacing Nathalie Sénéchault, who will leave the company after taking over as CFO last year. Saleh was previously the CEO of the healthcare company Gainwell Technologies.
