Low Code Software Company CLEVR Acquires Digitread PLM System

CLEVR, a low-code and no-code software-with-a-service specialist, has acquired Digitread, an emerging company focused on Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) system integration and a “platinum-level” solution partner of Siemens.

The acquisition should help raise CLEVR‘s profile and support its geographic and vertical expansion within the industrial, manufacturing, marine and energy industry, according to a release.

As noted in the announcement, the deal is supported by management and “funded by CLEVR’s majority shareholder, London-based Volpi Capital.”

“Digitread enables us to combine PLM rock stars with CLEVR’s low-code Mendix champions,” says Angelique Schouten, CEO at CLEVR. “Very few companies can do what Digitread does, configuring and integrating some of the world’s most complex systems in the industrial, manufacturing and marine space. We’ll combine Digitread’s high-touch approach with CLEVR’s high-tech expertise and help manufacturing companies across the globe complete their digital transformations by offering off-the-shelf solutions and highly specialized consultancy services.”

Based in Norway, with additional buainess offices in Germany and Lithuania, Digitread is reportedly a market that “generates $26 billion a year.” Digitread’s 100+ clients include firms like Kongsberg, Nexans and OneSubsea.

“Everyone at Digitread is excited about working shoulder to shoulder with CLEVR. PLM systems are product biographers,” says Magnus Normann, Digitread’s CEO. “PLM is the process of managing a product and data from concept through design, manufacturing, service and finally disposal. With the help of monitoring tools, they convey detailed digital stories about products to managers, enabling them to increase sustainability, identify weaknesses, perform preventative maintenance, refine product performance or inform them on how to build new products. Low-code and no-code technology will help tell that story. The combination of skills and knowledge is good news for our customers.”

The financial terms of the transaction have not been shared publicly.

As previously reported, CLEVR is the low-code and no-code Software-with-a-Service (SWAS) solutions provider and “the largest global Mendix expert partner.”

Managers overseeing the digitalization of their firms require skilled and experienced developers to help “extract all the value and benefits available from low- and no-code development tools.” CLEVR operates in 17 countries with a team of 230 people and “supplies over 400 customers, including Continental, ING, eXp Realty, Siemens, Rituals, Cargolux, Nutricia, Etos, Eneco, Stella Fietsen, Mondi Group and T-Systems with solutions, services and tooling.”

Volpi Capital has “supported CLEVR’s buy-and-build strategy since 2019.”

As noted in the release, Volpi Capital is a specialist European lower mid-market private equity firm. Volpi has a “thesis-driven” approach “targeting ambitious businesses using enabling technologies to disrupt traditional B2B value chains.”

Volpi typically “invests €25-75 million of equity in businesses with enterprise values between €50 million and €200 million and seeks to drive transformative growth through international expansion and consolidation.”

The company, which was established back in 2016 by Crevan O’Grady and Marco Sodi, “closed its first fund (Volpi Capital Fund I) in April 2018 with commitments of €185 million and its second fund (Volpi Capital Fund II) in January 2021 of €323 million.”

Sources: Press materials received from the company and additional information gleaned from the company’s website.