NEW YORK, Jan. 8, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — CVC Capital Partners (“CVC”) announced today that the CVC Growth Fund has signed a definitive agreement to sell Kount Inc. (“Kount” or “the Company”), a provider of Artificial Intelligence (AI)- driven fraud prevention and digital identity solutions, to global data and analytics company Equifax in a deal valued at $640 million. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2021, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory review.

Formed in 2007 and headquartered in Boise, Idaho, Kount’s best-in-class fraud prevention solutions protect the customer journey and digital innovations for over 9,000 brands globally. The Company has earned recognition as a leader in digital fraud prevention, with over 13 years of data informing its advanced Machine Learning (ML) and AI-based models. This patented technology prevents digital payments fraud, new account fraud, and account takeovers to increase revenue for digital businesses, acquiring banks, and payment service providers.

“Kount was an industry leader when the CVC Growth Fund invested, and since then the company has gone from strength to strength under CEO Brad Wiskirchen’s leadership, more than tripling revenue during the investment period,” said Jason Glass, Partner at CVC Growth Partners. “Through a trusted relationship with Brad, we have supported the expansion of the management team, new investment in sales and marketing and the launch of industry-leading product offerings including Kount Control, the first adaptive protection solution to stop account takeover fraud, and the Kount Identity Trust Global Network.”

“I would like to thank the CVC Growth Partners team for an incredibly rewarding partnership over the past five years,” said Wiskirchen. “The challenges of online fraud have grown exponentially and, with the guidance and support of CVC, Kount has been able to not just meet those challenges but also innovate and extend our industry leadership. Today we are well positioned to take our business to the next level with Equifax.”

“Our partnership with Kount is a perfect example of CVC Growth Partners’ strategy in action,” added John Clark, Managing Partner at CVC Growth Partners. “Through our thematic origination approach we source opportunities to partner with uniquely positioned technology companies in large, growing markets. We then help them to overcome barriers to growth, and to successfully accelerate their development, empowering them to become leaders in their fields.”

Barclays acted as exclusive financial advisor and Fried Frank acted as legal advisor to Kount.

Notes to editors

For CVC Capital Partners
Carsten Huwendiek
Global Head of Communications and Marketing
+44 20 7420 4200
chuwendiek@cvc.com 

About CVC Capital Partners
CVC is a leading private equity and investment advisory firm. Founded in 1981, CVC today has a network of 23 offices and over 550 employees throughout Europe, Asia and the US. To date, CVC has secured commitments of over US$160 billion from some of the world’s leading institutional investors across its private equity and credit strategies. In total, CVC currently manages approximately US$109 billion of assets. Today, funds managed or advised by CVC are invested in over 85 companies worldwide, employing more than 400,000 people in numerous countries. Together, these companies have combined annual sales of approximately US$93 billion. For further information about CVC please visit: www.cvc.com.

About CVC Growth Partners
Launched in 2014, CVC Growth Partners is the growth-oriented middle-market technology investment arm of CVC Capital Partners. CVC Growth Partners primarily targets equity investments between $50 million and $250 million in North America and Europe and manages over US$2.5 billion in assets across two dedicated funds. For further information about CVC Growth Partners please visit: www.cvc.com/growth.

About Kount
Kount’s Identity Trust Global Network delivers real-time fraud prevention and account protection and enables personalized customer experiences for more than 9,000 leading brands and payment providers. Linked by Kount’s award-winning AI, the Identity Trust Global Network analyzes signals from 32 billion annual interactions to personalize user experiences across the spectrum of trust—from frictionless experiences to blocking fraud. Quick and accurate identity trust decisions deliver safe payment, account creation and login events while reducing digital fraud, chargebacks, false positives and manual reviews. www.kount.com

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SOURCE CVC Capital Partners