Acuity Knowledge Partners Acquires PPA Group to Expand Automation Capabilities for Commercial Lenders

LONDON — Acuity Knowledge Partners (“Acuity”), a leading provider of high-value research, analytics and business intelligence solutions to the financial services sector, today announced the acquisition of PPA Group (“PPA”).

PPA is a leading technology-enabled service provider to financial institutions in Germany and Switzerland, providing services focused on bespoke structuring of global financial and ESG data for commercial lending and ESG analysis.

With offices in Darmstadt, Germany and Zurich, Switzerland, PPA has over two decades of experience in working with leading European banks to help them better understand and utilise complex counterparty data. PPA’s software-enabled services, developed in-house, and deep domain expertise deliver accurate, cost-effective and secure results to its growing client base.

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“Advanced, accurate and timely data processing to assist financial institutions engaged in commercial lending is a key growth area for Acuity. The acquisition of PPA Group is a strategic investment to support Acuity’s commitment and growing presence in supporting best practices in commercial lending. I am also delighted that we will partner with the highly experienced PPA management team to scale this business and bring its capabilities to Acuity’s global client base,” said Robert King, Chief Executive Officer, Acuity Knowledge Partners. “Our combined platform will provide clients with a market-leading service, and we look forward to integrating PPA’s innovative use of AI and Machine Learning into our portfolio of solutions. The acquisition also adds direct presence in two important and major European financial markets, Germany, and Switzerland.”

Heimo Saubach, Chief Executive Officer, PPA Group, said, “We have built a best-in-class data extraction and processing business serving European lending customers. Becoming part of Acuity Knowledge Partners will allow us to expand our market share globally and provide additional value to our existing customer base. It also means we can combine our advanced understanding of AI platforms with that of Acuity to create new and market-leading solutions. Acuity and PPA share the same mission of being a strategic and trusted partner to our customers and a great place to work for our employees. We feel very comfortable becoming part of Acuity and are confident that we can add value to our common endeavours.”

4GC acted as the exclusive M&A advisor for PPA.

About Acuity Knowledge Partners

Acuity Knowledge Partners (Acuity) is a leading provider of bespoke research, analytics and technology solutions to the financial services sector, including asset managers, corporate and investment banks, private equity and venture capital firms, hedge funds and consulting firms. Its global network of over 6,000 analysts and industry experts, combined with proprietary technology, supports more than 600 financial institutions and consulting companies to operate more efficiently, unlock their human capital and transform operations. Acuity is headquartered in London and operates from 10 locations worldwide.

Acuity was established as a separate business from Moody’s Corporation in 2019, following its acquisition by Equistone Partners Europe (Equistone). In January 2023, funds advised by global private equity firm Permira acquired a majority stake in the business from Equistone, which remains invested as a minority shareholder.

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For more information, visit www.acuitykp.com

About PPA Group

PPA Group is a leading technology partner and service provider for the digitalization and preparation of corporate data on behalf of financial service providers. More than 50 commercial banks from the D-A-CH region have outsourced the process of data preparation for internal bank decision-making processes to PPA. Around 150 experts at the locations in Darmstadt (D) and Glattbrugg (CH) process more than 300,000 documents per year. PPA combines the capabilities of artificial intelligence and trained experts in a hybrid process approach and delivers individually structured data in customer-specific processes. Compliance with the regulatory requirements for outsourcing management for banks (Bundesbank, EBA, FINMA) is confirmed annually by external audits.