Xansa receives bid - Shares up over 35%

Xansa has announced that it is in "advanced bid talks" sendings its shares up over 35% and valuing the company at £362m.

Times Online said "Speculation about the suitor for the company, whose clients include Barclaycard, BT and Royal Mail, rested on Cap Gemini, the French IT group and LogicaCMG, the Anglo-Dutch IT services player. City sources also suggested that private equity players SilverLake and Permira could be involved. Tata Consultancy Services, India's largest outsourcer, was also named as a potential bidder. "

Well, for more years than I care to recall, Xansa has been on everyone's target list. Not surprising as Xansa, with 2006 sales of £357.3m, is one of the very few "mid-sized" UK IT Services companies left! Xansa makes all of its revenue from the UK (which makes it attractive to overseas bidders), has a very sizeable Indian presence (which makes it attractive to UK bidders as well) and is now a quite significant BPO player (which makes it attractive to the Indians too!) . So the nationality of the mystery buyer could be almost anywhere!

CEO Alistair Cox (who I rated) has just left to take up the CEO role at Hays. So this was a 'good' time to explore other strategic options.

I'm not party to any insider information on this one but my money would be on a bidder not listed in the Times "speculation".