Today IBM just announced the $387MM acquisition of Toronto-based Algorithmics. It begs a couple of open questions. Is Algorithmics after being sold to Fitch for $174MM in 2004 still a Canadian startup? Can a 30 year old company like MKS be considered a startup? Is Eloqua who’s HQ moved to Virginia still a Canadian company?
If you imagine that Algorithmics is the second Canadian software startup acquired for more than $300MM in the past 6 months. Then to answer Dan Morel’s question, if this was “The One Billion Dollar Year” for Canadian startup acquisitions, yes it is. Only if you consider Algorithmics still a Canadian startup and 30 year old MKS a startup, then combined with Radian6 the acquisitions total just over $1B, everything else is icing on the proverbial cake.
Congratulations to the Algorithmics team and alumni.
Adding to the TechVibes list of Canadian Acquisitions:
1/5/2011 – Victoria’s Flock acquired by Zynga
1/6/2011 – Edmonton’s Attassa acquired by YouSendIt
1/31/2011 – Toronto’s Adenyo acquired by Motricity for $100 Million
2/8/2011 – Toronto’s MyThum acquired by OLSON
3/3/2011 – Toronto’s CoverItLive acquired by Demand Media
3/11/2011 – Vancouver’s Sayvee acquired by Bandzoogle
3/26/2011 – Waterloo’s Tiny Hippos acquired by RIM
3/30/2011 – New Brunswick’s Radian6 acquired by Salesforce for $326 Million
4/7/2011 – Waterloo’s MKS acquired by Parametric Technology for $292 Million
4/8/2011 – Toronto’s PushLife acquired by Google for $25 Million
4/27/2011 – Montreal’s Tungle acquired by RIM
4/28/2011 – Montreal’s Coradiant acquired by BMC
5/10/2011 – Toronto’s Conversition acquired by e-Rewards
6/3/2011 – Waterloo’s PostRank acquired by Google
6/7/2011 – Toronto’s DealFrenzy acquired by Intertainment Media
7/8/2011 – Toronto’s FiveMobile acquired by Zynga
8/30/2011 – Vancouver’s Zite acquired by CNN for an estimated $25MM
9/1/2011 – Toronto’s Algorithmics acquired by IBM for $387MM