Oakley Capital Private Equity III (“Fund III”) has completed a deal to acquire the assets and operations of Plesk, at an enterprise value of $105 million, as a carve out from the Parallels Group. Fund III has invested $27.4 million (€25.2 million) for a 51% controlling stake in the business. The investment in Plesk represents another primary, proprietary deal in one of Oakley’s core sectors, originating from long-standing relationships within the hosting industry.

First released in 1999, Plesk is one of the most widely used control panels and software platforms for simplifying the lives of Web Professionals. Plesk’s web-server management tools secure and automate server and website administration as well as operations. Key features include the automation and management of domain names, email accounts, web applications, programming languages, databases and infrastructure tasks to provide a ready-to-code environment and strong security across all layers and operating systems. The Plesk software platform operates on more than 350,000 servers globally, supporting the operations of more than 10 million websites and 18 million email boxes. Plesk is available in 32 languages globally and many of the top cloud and hosting service providers partner with Plesk.

Plesk generated revenues of $28 million and EBITDA of approximately $14 million for the year ended 31 December 2016. The business is expected to drive growth through a number of clearly identified revenue and operational initiatives, made possible by focussed management following its separation from the Parallels Group.

Arthur Mornington, Partner Oakley Capital, commented:

“We are delighted to be investing in Plesk, which is a widely used software platform with significant growth potential in a sector we know well. We are excited to be partnering with a strong management team and we believe that our combined experience will support the business as it moves into the next phase of its development.”