American Express takes 13% Position in Concur: Cash for Expansion
Posted by Bob Warfield on July 29, 2008
American Express has taken a 13% position in SaaS Travel & Expense provider Concur in exchange for a $251 million cash investment and a seat on the board.
Concur has been on an acquisition spree, but cash had fallen to about $17M. This new infusion should open up all sorts of additional possibilities given the place they occupy in the ecosystem. Concur has already been a very partner centric business.
I’ve chatted with Concur CEO Steve Singh from time and time and always come away impressed with the company.
While they have not yet reached the scale of Salesforce.com ($172M annual revenue versus $800+M), other key statistics such as their price to sales ratio (they trade at 9x revenue as I write this) and cash (nearly identical cash post this transaction) are suddenly the same.
This may give Concur the fuel they need to close in to a solid #2 SaaS player position behind Salesforce.com.
2 Responses to “American Express takes 13% Position in Concur: Cash for Expansion”
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Enterprise Alley mobile edition said
[…] and the ability to re-bill (where appropriate.) It all started when there was a discussion around Concur and Rearden Commerce as two companies acquiring to flesh out their offerings and take strong […]
mmankow said
I agree that Concur is one of the best run SaaS companies out there and Steve Singh is a first class CEO. I’m waiting for Concur to either be acquired or buy another SaaS company (procurement perhaps) to build out its business.