Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier advises Atos on entering into exclusive negotiations with the French State for the sale of its Advanced Computing activities

Paris, 28 November 2024

Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier is advising Atos SE in its discussions with the French State leading to the receipt of a non-binding offer from the French State for the potential acquisition of 100% of the Advanced Computing activities of the BDS division of Atos SE, based on an enterprise value of €500 million, to be potentially increased to €625 million including earn-outs.

Atos’ Advanced Computing activities comprise the High-Performance Computing (HPC) & Quantum divisions as well as the Business Computing & Artificial intelligence divisions. The business currently employs around 2,500 people and has generated sales revenues of around €570 million in 2023.

In addition, Atos would commit to launch a formal sale process for its Cybersecurity products and Mission Critical Systems, which generated revenue of circa €340 million in 2023.

Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier also advised the Atos Group on the issue by Bull SA of a preference share to the French State in order to protect national interests in respect of certain activities carried out by the Group, further to the agreement entered into between Atos SE, Bull SA and the French State on 26 June 2024.

The Darrois Villey Maillot Brochier team is led by Bertrand Cardi, François Kopf and Laurent Gautier (partners), Isabelle Touré-Farah (counsel) as well as Paul Bertrand, Sophie Robert, Charles Seveyras, Alexandre Collet-Koppany and Mehdi Tiguidda for the M&A and capital markets aspects, Martin Lebeuf (partner), Maxime Garcia (counsel) and Sami Tareb for the financing aspects, Inès de Matharel and Anaïs Alle for restructuring aspects, Didier Théophile and Constance Bocket (partners) and Thomas Servières on competition law aspects and Henri Savoie (partner) and Guillaume Griffart (counsel) on public law and regulatory issues.