이 기사는 2020년 03월 12일 08:00 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

A consortium composed of South Korea’s private equity (PE) firm Stonebridge Capital and Payletter has closed its acquisition of KSNET, a leading payment solutions provider.

According to industry sources, the consortium has finalized its acquisition of a 100 percent stake in Net1 UEPS Technologies (Net1), the largest shareholder of KSNET, for around 280 billion won on March 9.

Thanks to its distinct strength like firm banking business, KSNET has attracted interests from several potential buyers during its public auction process.

In order to acquire KSNET, Stonebridge Capital established a special purpose company and launched a 100 billion won project fund to finance the deal. The Korean Teachers' Credit Union has committed 70 billion won in the fund as an anchor investor.

Payletter is a global online billing and payment service provider with a payment gateway (PG) market share of four to five percent. Stonebridge Ventures invested in Payletter in 2018. Payletter and KSNET together will make a market share of 10 percent, closing a gap between the two and NHN KCP whose market share stands at mid-to-high 10 percent.

Payletter invested 50 billion won in KSNET and financed around 130 billion won through acquisition financing arranged by Nonghyup Bank and Woori Bank.

KSNET was put up for sale in the first half of 2019. The preliminary bidding took place in September and the final bid took place in November. The sell-side chose the shortlisted Stonebridge-Payletter consortium as the preferred bidder in mid-November and both sides signed a stock purchase agreement (SPA) in January 2020 after negotiating warranty and indemnity (W&I) insurance policy.

KSNET last changed hands 10 years ago when a consortium composed of H&Q and Payment Service Asia in 2007 took over a 100 percent stake in the company from Lee Min-joo, chairman of Atinum Partners, and sold to South African value-added network (VAN) service provider Net1 in 2010.

Financial Technology Partners, Samjung KPMG, and Yulchon acted as the sell-side’s advisors. The buy-side hired EY Han Young and Shin & Kim as its advisors and consulted with AT Kearney about commercial due diligence.

(By reporter Rho Ar-rum)