이 기사는 2021년 08월 20일 08시01분 thebell에 표출된 기사입니다

Affirma Capital is betting on the growth of the cloud computing market with a minority investment in Seoul-based managed service provider Metanet Tplatform.

The Singapore-headquartered private equity firm signed a share purchase agreement to acquire a 20% stake in Metanet Tplatform for 112.5 billion won ($96 million), according to industry sources on Wednesday.

Metanet Tplatform is the third largest cloud managed service provider in South Korea by revenue. The company – which is one of the top partners of Microsoft Azure, the world’s second largest cloud service provider – was named as the Microsoft 2020 Partner of the Year. It also earned the Microsoft Azure Advanced Specialization certification in Windows Server and SQL Server Migration earlier this year for the first time among South Korean managed service providers.

The company offers services to help enterprises shift to clouding computing, migrate computing workloads from on-premise data centers to cloud infrastructure and operate cloud services.

Originally founded under the name DIS-EDS in 2007, Metanet Tplatform was a provider of operations and maintenance services for on-premise data centers owned by domestic conglomerates and financial services groups.

Shifting its focus to public cloud services, the company has positioned itself as a leading end-to-end hybrid cloud solutions provider in South Korea.

The largest shareholder in the company is Metanet Global, with an 85.61% stake. Metanet Global is owned by Metanet founder and chairman Choi Young-sang.

Metanet Tplatform has been actively working with other affiliates under Metanet’s wing, such as A.T. Kearney Korea and Metanet DT, in terms of sales network and technology. This distinguishes the company from its smaller rivals. Metanet’s affiliates represent total sales of nearly 900 billion won.

The deal is the result of the 14-month long discussions between Affirma Capital and Metanet Tplatform. The emerging-market focused private equity firm last year approached the company regarding a stake purchase to gain exposure to the fast-growing cloud computing industry.

Affirma Capital will help Metanet Tplatform expand into overseas markets through partnerships with its other portfolio companies. The private equity firm’s global team has built a portfolio of tech companies in Southeast Asia and India. (Reporting by Hee-yeon Han)