Qlik closes Talend acquisition to strengthen data capabilities

Data analytics and visualization firm Qlik said on Wednesday that it has closed its acquisition of Talend, a data management company, adding new capabilities to its growing data integration platform.

Data integration refers to the technical and business processes used to combine data from multiple sources to provide a unified, single view of the data.

The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but a statement said that the combined company will be led by chief executive officer Mike Capone, formerly CEO of Qlik. Christal Bemont, former Talend chief executive, left earlier this year during the takeover process as an interim management team took charge.

“Qlik, together with Talend, will bring significant benefits to customers, including expanded product offerings, enhanced support and services, and increased investments in innovation and R&D,” said Mike Capone. “Qlik's broad expertise in data integration, analytics, AI and machine learning combined with Talend's data integration and data quality solutions, will provide customers the most comprehensive solution in the industry.”

Qlik was founded in 1993 in Sweden and was in the data analytics space, much like its peers Tableau and Talend. Both Qlik and Talend are backed by Thoma Bravo, a private equity firm with more than $114 billion in assets. In August 2016, Thoma Bravo executed a private equity buyout of Qlik for $3 billion six years after its initial IPO.

Meanwhile, in 2019, tech major Salesforce bought Tableau for $15.7 billion. In the last five years or so, Qlik has built up a data integration platform through acquisitions and product development. Talend, meanwhile, specializes in data transformation and data quality, offering a platform that enables users to unify data culled from various sources.

In January however, Qlik began the process of conducting an initial public stock offering. Today, Qlik claims to support 40,000 customers in over 100 countries, with global firms including Airbus, Ford and Deloitte among its clients. Talend also counts AstraZeneca, Lenovo and drinks company ABInBev among its customers.

These are two market-leading companies that will enable their customers to benefit across the data and analytics lifecycle regardless of where they are in their digital transformation journey,” said Mike Leone, Principal Analyst for Analytics and AI, Enterprise Strategy Group. 

“So many data initiatives are seeking to build trust within the data ecosystem, and it’s not just the data. It’s the processes and people too. I’m truly excited for their joint customers. By marrying Qlik’s existing presence in the data integration space with Talend, customers will see more robust data integration capabilities and powerful data governance to deliver the confidence and trust they desire.," he said.

With the acquisition of Talend, Qlik is adding application and API integration, a data fabric approach to combining data, and improved data integrity and governance capabilities.