The Citadel Group Limited (CGL), a $200 million listed Australian solution provider to Governments and the private sector, has acquired Kapish for $A17.5 million. Kapish is one of only two Australian Gold Business Partners for the HPE Content Manager (ex TRIM/RM) suite of document and records management solutions (the other is Optus).

Kapish founders Simon Driscoll and J.P. Williams will remain with the company which will continue to operate independently.

Citadel Group companies have a long history of integrating ECM solutions within Australia, including a major deployment of the Objective EDRMS to more than 12,000 users at Defence, in addition to the Australian Government Solicitor and ASIC. It also has in-house SharePoint expertise.

Citadel Group founders Miles Jakemen and Mark McConnell both have a background in the military, while Dr Jakeman was seconded to ASIO for counter-terrorism planning for the Sydney Olympics in 2000.

Founded over 9 years ago, Kapish has grown from a small start-up, to a Tier 1 HPE Software Gold Partner with 180 clients across local and state government agencies and unique IP in the content management and software integration space. It has developed a variety of commercial HP TRIM/RM add-ons to enhance integration with Microsoft Windows and Office and various enterprise applications.

Citadel intends to adapt the Kapish IP for both the Objective EDRMS and SharePoint, and vice versa for its own unique add-ons.

In a related move, Citadel has increased its long-standing investment in filosoph-e to 50%, a company it says has an established pedigree with enterprise content management in secure environments.

Combined with the acquisition of Kapish, Citadel is expecting to actively target the corporate, health and education markets applying ‘cloud first’ and software-as-a-service directives.

Citadel purchased Melbourne-based health services provider, PJA Solutions last year in a deal worth $A60 million

Citadel’s health division has also signed a three year contract renewal until 2019 with Pathology North for the provision of complex laboratory information systems, database integration work and delivery and support of new capabilities including blood management (e-Blood). The contract builds on Citadel’s clients in the health sector, which also includes Queensland Health, Eastern Health and The National Blood Authority’s BloodNet system, which allows national blood and blood products information to be shared with Citadel’s AUSLAB system.

Citadel’s Managing Director/CEO, Dr Miles Jakeman, said, “Kapish is a natural augmentation to Citadel’s existing knowledge management capabilities and significantly expands our market share in local and state governments..”

“Citadel’s growth strategy is underpinned by a combination of organic growth and M&A activity. These activities enhance Citadel’s position as Australia’s leading provider of Managed Services in complex, knowledge-driven environments.

“With a strong pipeline of organic growth opportunities that will continue to be supplemented through further acquisitions, Citadel is well placed to continue its growth trajectory”, added Dr Jakeman.

“Citadel is continuing to see strong organic growth through commercialising its unique IP. Our long- term client relationships and increasing number of recurring revenue contracts have been bolstered by the acquisition of Kapish which, in itself, is expected to add $A4 million of EBITDA in FY17. Going forward, Citadel will continue to explore acquisitions where appropriate to support its known organic growth opportunities,” said Dr Jakeman.