Actian To Acquire Pervasive Software In Latest Big Data Push

The deal is valued at $161.9 million, with Actian acquiring all of Pervasive's outstanding shares for $9.20 apiece. The Redwood, Calif.-based company had been eyeing Pervasive for months, originally making an unsolicited bid back in August for $8.50 a share and then again in November for $9 a share.

"After a deliberative process and thorough assessment of our strategic alternatives, the Pervasive board of directors has determined that this transaction represents the best value for our shareholders, employees and customers," said John Farr, Pervasive president and CEO, in a statement.

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Actian said the acquisition will marry Pervasive's big data analytics solutions, including its Data Rush and Data Cloud offerings, with its own Vectorwise SQL database for high-performance analytics. The combined product portfolio, Actian said, will be one that arms organizations with real-time analytical insights into vast amounts of unstructured data.

"Big data is an opportunity and a challenge for organizations in every industry, with potentially valuable business critical insight locked away in inaccessible and indecipherable systems. This makes data management and insight today's big question for businesses looking at how to unlock the substantial incremental business value in their big data," said Steve Shine, CEO and president of Actian, in a statement. "This transaction combines the proven ability of both companies to out-innovate and out-perform the industry giants allowing us to deliver the promise of big data to every organization."

Pervasive said the deal is expected to close during the second quarter of 2013.

Actian, whose customers today include the University of Oxford and eBay, also acquired data management vendor Versant in December, with a similar aim of growing its big data portfolio. Versant offers products including JPA, a NoSQL database that offers the kind of flexibility and scalability needed to run big data applications, along with db40, an open source object database for Java and .NET solutions.

The December deal was valued at about $37 million, with Actian paying $13 for each Versant share.

PUBLISHED JAN. 29, 2013