Google acquires Apigee in $625 million deal to expand enterprise

New York: Google is buying software development toolmaker Apigee Corp. for $625 million, the latest move by the search giant to bulk up its cloud-based offerings for businesses.

Alphabet Inc.’s Google has agreed to pay $17.40 a share in cash, San Jose, California-based Apigee said in a statement Thursday. That’s a 6.5% premium to Apigee’s closing price on Wednesday. The companies expect the deal to be completed by the end of the year.

Apigee sells a platform that aids companies in managing their APIs, which are programming tools that help developers build software that talks to each other and shares information without revealing the underlying code. APIs have become an integral part of cloud software development, allowing one application to pull data and use services from multiple other programs.

“The addition of Apigee’s API solutions to Google cloud will accelerate our customers’ move to supporting their businesses with high quality digital interactions,” Diane Greene, senior vice president of Google’s cloud business, said in a blog post, referring to application program interface products.

Apigee counts among its customers Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc., AT&T Inc., Live Nation Entertainment Inc. and Burberry Group PLC. Walgreens uses Apigee to offer APIs and analyze how the tools are being used. Developers, for instance, can easily incorporate a feature into their apps that allows users to print photos at any Walgreens store, Greene said.

Google has been working on bulking up its enterprise-focused products, having lagged behind Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. in selling its public cloud computing software to companies. Greene joined Google late last year to lead the effort and has focused on broadening Google’s tool set to attract less technically savvy customers. The Apigee acquisition will also help support Google’s own set of APIs, which include ones that allow developers to pull information from YouTube as well as the Translate and Maps software to imbed in their own apps.

“They’re looking for assets to build out their cloud business,” said James Cordwell, an analyst at Atlantic Equities. “Clearly this fits into that area and they are looking for specific niches where they can really differentiate themselves.”

Google was little changed at $802.42. The shares were up 3.9% this year through Wednesday. Apigee jumped 6.7% to $17.44. Bloomberg