We took the view yesterday (see Enigmatic brushes off Clarity’s offer objections) that Clarity Commerce might be anticipating a bid from someone other than Enigmatic Investments and it turns out that “several indicative expressions of interest” are being shown in the POS company. A bidding war is brewing
There’s a long way between interest and offer so the parties have not been named but are described as “strategic customer engagement software providers in the retail and entertainment sectors”.
Clarity Commerce has taken the line that Enigmatic Investments undervalues the company and believes it is only interested in the retail side not the entertainment business, so has priced its offer accordingly (23p per share, valuing the company at about £9.5m).
Clarity Commerce’s hope is that someone else will be interested in a wider set of its products and markets and therefore come in with a higher bid. Given the indication that there are interested parties from the retail sector and the entertainment sector, that hope may not play out unless any of them operate across the two verticals. However, the reference to “strategic” suggests that the parties mulling over Clarity Commerce may be looking at the company as a way of expanding their footprints.
Having taken on Arbuthnot Securities and The McLean Group to help it explore its strategic options, more activity can be anticipated, especially given the combination of the fragmented state of the POS market and the unstable economic situation.