Indigio merges into Bridgeline Software. Mission Complete!
July 18th, 2008When I left my role as COO of Indigio back in January I was extremely excited because I was given the chance to focus 100% of my efforts on a growth via acquisitions strategy. My goal was pretty straight forward from day one.This was to have the results of my efforts in the M&A role result in Indigio being a healthier, more profitable company thus increasing shareholder value over time. The originally vision was to acquire two interactive agencies and/or search engine marketing companies of like size to Indigio. One was to be located near New York City and one was to be located near Chicago. For many reasons, the plan changed rather quickly to focusing on a regional strategy of acquiring smaller Denver based companies or possibly Phoenix based companies. We were actually doing very well executing against this strategy and had located some interested parties in both Denver and Phoenix. And then I came across Bridgeline.
After doing some initial review of Bridgeline, it was very evident that Indigio would make an excellent addition to their acquisition portfolio. I sent Bridgeline an introduction email and described what Indigio did.
Apparently they felt we would make a good addition as well as things moved very quickly after that. Bridgeline came to Denver to meet with us and see what we were all about. Tim Higgins and I went to Boston to meet with them and to see their corporate offices. Along the way we started sharing information relative to a potential merger. This helped us to agree on the basic terms and then the fun started. The due diligence process! Let’s just say that the management team of Indigio did an unbelievable job of putting together the diligence items while they continued to keep Indigio running at full speed. A real tribute to all of them because I am making this process sound easy and it is anything but easy when you are dealing with a public company. It is time consuming and for the wrong individuals could have been very defocusing. The management team didn’t miss a step.
The final merger agreement was inked in Denver on June 30th and the announcement was made the morning of July 1st. For more information on the announcement, go to http://www.bridgelinesw.com/page.aspx?content=402hk.
For me personally, this was mission complete. I moved into the M&A role on January 23rd. The merger was complete by June 30th and I still find that to be truly amazing. In addition to Bridgeline, I also got the opportunity to meet so many interesting entrepreneurs of interesting companies along the way. That alone made this all worth while for me but for the Indigio shareholders, employees and customers it was important that I execute on the original goal. I can say I feel very good that Indigio comes out of this merger as a healthier, more profitable company and I think it is safe to say that this was a win for the Indigio shareholders.
MISSION COMPLETE!
