Frankfurt am Main / Bronschhofen, May 13th, 2020. The Swissbit management team and Ardian, a world leading private investment house, announced today that they have signed an agreement to acquire Swissbit Holding AG (“Swissbit”) based in Bronschhofen, Switzerland. The company is a leading global manufacturer of storage and embedded IoT solutions with its own production facilities in Germany.

In this transaction, Ardian will acquire a majority stake in Swissbit. Swissbit’s existing management team led by Silvio Muschter, Thomas Luft, Vincenzo Esposito and Matthias Poppel will significantly reinvest in the company as part of the transaction and will hold a substantial stake in the company, thereby ensuring continuity in the management of the business. With the help of Ardian, the positive growth trend will continue to accelerate. The parties have agreed not to disclose financial details of the transaction, which is subject to approval by the antitrust authorities.
Swissbit is the only independent European provider of NAND flash-based storage and embedded IoT solutions for demanding niche applications in a wide range of end markets. The company manufactures high-quality storage media such as SD and microSD cards, SSD hard drives, and USB memory modules for mission-critical applications. The products are manufactured exclusively at Swissbit’s state-of-the-art production facility in Berlin, which commenced operations in October 2019.
Such solutions are used for example in industrial automation applications and network communication technology, as well as in the security sector and in medical technology. Swissbit’s embedded IoT storage solutions are highly relevant especially in the fiscal and security segments.

The company’s storage solutions stand out due to their high degree of customization for specialized storage and computing applications.
Swissbit was created through a management buyout from the Siemens Memory division in 2001. With its innovative strength and extensive research and development capacities, Swissbit is optimally positioned to benefit from the rapidly evolving IoT and edge computing market trends in a wide range of applications.

The company currently has more than 700 customers, including numerous renowned industrial, medical and technology companies. Together with Ardian as a strong global partner, Swissbit intends to continue to accelerate the internationalization of the company in North America and Asia. In addition, management aims to increase the considerable growth potential in the embedded IoT segment, thanks to the variety of new, rapidly growing applications for Swissbit’s specialized storage solutions.

Dirk Wittneben, Managing Director and Head of Ardian Expansion in Germany, said: “The main factors for our investment in the company were Swissbit’s convincing and promising business model combined with an excellent management team with many years of industry experience and strong technological expertise. We look forward to working in partnership with the management and supporting the company as it continues down its path of growth towards a successful future.”

Silvio Muschter, CEO of Swissbit, added: “The digitization and networking of devices in the Internet of Things drives the demand for secure, high-quality storage products from our memory division and the security solutions from our embedded IoT division. Above all, data is the most valuable asset. At Swissbit, we see it as our central task to reliably store and protect this data. For this reason, we have systematically created a new, state-of-the-art electronics production facility in Berlin, set up the Embedded IoT business unit and successfully developed innovative hardware-based security products in recent years. With Ardian, we have found a financially strong and globally connected partner for our further planned growth in new markets.”

Swissbit AG is the only independent European manufacturer of storage and embedded IoT solutions for demanding applications. Swissbit combines its unique competences in storage and embedded IoT technology with its expertise in advanced packaging to store and protect data reliably in industrial, NetCom, automotive, medical and finance applications as well as across the Internet of Things (IoT). The company develops and manufactures industrial-grade storage and security products “Made in Germany” with long-term availability, high reliability and custom optimization. Swissbit’s storage range includes SSDs with PCIe and SATA interface such as mSATA, Slim SATA, CFast™, M.2 and 2.5” as well as CompactFlash, USB flash drives, SD, micro SD memory cards and managed NAND BGAs. Security products for embedded IoT applications are available in various application specific editions as USB flash drives, SD, and micro SD memory cards. Swissbit was founded in 2001 through a management buy-out of Siemens AG, and has offices in Switzerland, Germany, USA, Japan and Taiwan.

Ardian is a world-leading private investment house with assets of US$96bn managed or advised in Europe, the Americas and Asia. The company is majority-owned by its employees. It keeps entrepreneurship at its heart and focuses on delivering excellent investment performance to its global investor base.
Through its commitment to shared outcomes for all stakeholders, Ardian’s activities fuel individual, corporate and economic growth around the world.
Holding close its core values of excellence, loyalty and entrepreneurship, Ardian maintains a truly global network, with more than 680 employees working from fifteen offices across Europe (Frankfurt, Jersey, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Milan, Paris and Zurich), the Americas (New York, San Francisco and Santiago) and Asia (Beijing, Singapore, Tokyo and Seoul). It manages funds on behalf of more than 1,000 clients through five pillars of investment expertise: Fund of Funds, Direct Funds, Infrastructure, Real Estate and Private Debt.
Ardian on Twitter @Ardian

Seller
Swissbit: Roger Knobel, Daniele Tedesco, Silvio Muschter, Vincenzo Esposito, Thomas Luft, Matthias Poppel, Tony Cerreta
Financial: Deloitte (C. Tattersall, M. Horwat)
Legal: Bär & Karrer (C. Neeracher, R. Annasohn)
Tax: Deloitte (F. Poltera, R. Hintermann)
M&A and Debt Advisory: GCA Altium (A. Grünwald, R. Sauser, G. Baldwin, T. Weber, M. Schlup, D. Schreiber)

Buyer
Ardian: Dirk Wittneben, Marc Abadir, Yannic Metzger, Nicolas Münzer, Marlon Sandvoss
Commercial: McKinsey & Company (T. Eichner, H. Bauer, P. Ernst)
Financial: Deloitte (E. Sachsalber, N. Nobereit)
Legal: Latham & Watkins (B. Hesse, S. Pauls) / Niederer Kraft Frey (T. Spillmann, P. Peyer)
Tax: Taxess (G. Thomas, R. Schäfer) / Loyens & Loeff (B. Baumgartner, F. Sutter)
M&A and Debt Advisory: Lincoln International (Ø. Bjordal, C. Weis)