GBGroup expands global offering with £20.5m acquisition

Acquisition of DecTech Solutions will boost GBGroup's global fraud detection solution

GB GROUP PLC
("GBGroup", "GBG")

London, 24 April 2014

GBGroup (GBG), the identity intelligence specialist, is pleased to announce that it has agreed to acquire the entire issued share capital of DecTech Solutions Pty Ltd (DecTech), an Australian provider of fraud detection, risk management and customer on-boarding solutions for a total consideration of £20.5million.

DecTech has 60 team members serving customers in 42 countries across six locations in Asia, Australia and Europe where they support banks, financial services and insurance as well as emerging e Commerce clients. More recently they have expanded into the Middle East, Africa and South America leveraging their international customer base.

The acquisition by GBG will enable DecTech to continue to expand within Asia whilst providing an opportunity to work with GBG's customers across Europe and North America.

In summary the acquisition of DecTech will:

  • Allow GBG to access the fast expanding Asian market for online commerce powering decision making across banks, financial services, insurance and e Commerce through DecTech's leading and proven fraud detection & prevention solutions combined with GBG's leading Identity and Location Verification solutions.
  • Enable GBG to broaden service offerings to their 4000 plus clients across Europe and North America and jointly push into the Middle East, Eastern Europe and South America. 
  • Deliver a joint Identity & Fraud solution that enables DecTech and GBG customers to operate securely on a global scale.

Richard Law, GBGroup's CEO, commented,

''We believe the acquisition and integration of DecTech into the Group will considerably enhance our ability to serve our clients globally by extending our product suite with highly complementary technology that is in demand in both established and developing markets.

This acquisition extends our capability and geographic reach and enables us to further address the growing requirements for highly customisable electronic identity verification and fraud detection services across our combined customer bases.

GBG's products and services are increasingly being used to enable some of the world's leading e Commerce businesses to trade seamlessly and safely with their customers online and this acquisition will help us to advance our strategy in this area".

John Lord, GBGroup's Divisional Managing Director, commented,

"We are augmenting and broadening our product suite with technology that is in demand in both established and developing markets, while extending our geographic reach. Synergies between our respective product suites and customer demands will enable us to further address their growing requirements.

DecTech has a leading solution which is mirrored by GBG's expertise and leadership in Identity Intelligence. Both have global capability and together will deliver the leading identity and fraud suite which is data agnostic and can be deployed with cross border or local expertise.'' 

Sean Hollingdale, Founder and CEO of DecTech, commented,

"The founders and leadership of DecTech believe that by joining GBGroup we will enhance our leading fraud detection and prevention solutions whilst further enabling our risk management and customer on-boarding capabilities. GBG is the leading Identity Intelligence solution provider, with global capability and an enviable customer base, their solutions are highly innovative and an important enabler for our clients' continued success. 

Like DecTech, GBG is an innovative, customer centric and quality driven organisation.  It was important that we continue to display these values to both our customers and team members and with GBG we believe these values are enshrined in their culture that will enable the enlarged business to grow to a global scale."

About GBGroup

GBGroup's identity verification software seamlessly validates more than four billion consumers across the globe. Working in 240 countries and territories, GBGroup's technology provides identity intelligence that enables e Commerce on a global scale, meaning organisations can trade internationally with confidence, ensuring the transactions being made are genuine and verified while remaining compliant.

GBGroup deploys cutting edge technology that helps companies find, verify, understand, target and retain customers. Online ID verification enables companies to authenticate their potential customer in real-time, while also offering the scalability and efficiency needed for a global company. This not only lowers the incidence of fraudulent transactions, but also makes for a seamless, fluid customer experience.

About DecTech Solutions

Headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, and founded in 2001, DecTech supports predominantly banking and financial services clients in more than 40 countries from five additional offices throughout the Far East and one in Spain.

DecTech has been a Microsoft Partner since 2008, outperforming the Microsoft benchmark for customer satisfaction, and was awarded the "Best Risk Analytics Project Award 2012" by the Asian Banker Summit.

DecTech has 60 staff and posted revenues of £5.8m in the twelve months to December 2013 and adjusted underlying pre-tax profits of £2.3m.


For further information, please contact


GB Group plc

John Lord, Divisional Managing Director
Email: john.lord@gbgplc.com
Tel: +44 (0)1244 657033

Stephanie Clare, GBGroup
Email: stephanie.clare@gbgplc.com
Tel: +44 (0)1244 657020

Paul James, Bite Global
Email: paul.james@biteglobal.com
Tel: +44 (0)208 834 3402

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