Worldline to acquire Cardlink
Worldline SA (EPA:WLN), an expert in the area of payment and transaction services, today announced the signing of a bidding agreement for the acquisition of 92.5% of the share capital of Cardlink.
Founded in 2004, Cardlink is the leading Greek Network Services Provider (NSP) with an above 240,000 POS fleet (46% of POS transactions), managing c. 500 million of transactions a year (53% MSV market share). The company also provides more than 10,000 online merchants with strong value-added services through the Cardlink check-out offering.
The leading position of Cardlink coupled with Worldline’s global scale, best-in-class technologies, and payment expertise will allow the entity to grow revenue at a double-digit rate in the coming years. This accelerated growth rate will be delivered through POS acceptance deployment (white labels and Android offering), platform and processing leverage with main Greek banks, value-added services offering enlargement (analytics, loyalty, wallets), and one-stop-shop offering implementation (payment aggregator go-to-market).
This acquisition represents a privileged opportunity for Worldline to strongly expand its Merchant Services activities in this attractive European market. Worldline intends to further develop the longstanding partnerships of Cardlink with key local acquiring banks which are benefitting from its leading POS acceptance capabilities, its direct access to an existing and high-quality merchants’ portfolio, while generating significant growth opportunities fueled by increasing card penetration and online capabilities.
Furthermore, a robust integration and development program will be implemented at closing to further improve profitability rate through operating leverage and costs efficiency.
The transaction is set to result in additional annual revenue of c. € 40 million at closing with expected double-digit organic growth CAGR over the next 4 years. The estimated cash-out is c. € 130 million at closing (for 92.5% ownership), preserving Worldline’s financial flexibility and based on an c.11x EV/2020 OMDA multiple.
Closing is expected in H2 2021, subjected to satisfaction of customary condition precedent.