As Qlik's purchase is consummated, Tableau names AWS vet as new CEO

Tom Paine

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Done Deal.

That was the word today, as Thoma Bravo announced it had completed its $3 billion buyout of business intelligence vendor Qlik.

The private equity deal, reached in early June, was approved by Qlik shareholders last week. Shares of Qlik common stock were removed from listing on The NASDAQ Stock Market, with trading in Qlik shares suspended prior to the opening of business today.

Although the Philly area loses a major, publicly traded tech firm, at least Qlik remains based in Radnor. Although nothing is immutable; there is always a chance that the company, which has about 10% of approximately 2500 employees based out of Radnor, might be subject to some future combination with a company based elsewhere, and headquarters is usually the first to go in such situations.

In its last earnings report as a public company in July, Qlik reported revenue of $180.6 million and a net GAAP loss of 7 cents per share.

Though Thoma Bravo has no particular tie to the Philadelphia area that I know of, it now has four portfolio companies here. The other three are Elemica (Wayne), iPipeline (Exton), and Sparta Systems (Hamilton, NJ).

Ironically, the closest to being Qlik's arch rival, Seattle-based Tableau, today announced that Amazon Web Services veteran Adam Selipsky will become Tableau’s new CEO, replacing co-founder Christian Chabot, who will remain as chairman. That Selipsky comes from AWS may be an indictor of a greater emphasis on Tableau's cloud offering in the future.

Tableau, which had been on a torrid growth pace, lost almost 50% of its value on one day in February of this year after a missed forecast and hasn't really recovered since. In its most recent quarter Tableau reported a net GAAP loss of $47.5 million on revenue
of $198.5 million.