Amphire Acquires Makella Business From Bidvest Foodservice Group

Redwood Shores, CA - Amphire Solutions, the leading Software as a Service (SaaS) provider of ecommerce solutions for the foodservice industry and institutional supply chains, today announces it has completed the transaction to acquire Makella, a European provider of SaaS solutions based in the United Kingdom. Makella was previously owned by Bidvest Foodservice Group, the largest distributor to the UK foodservice industry. Bidvest operates in the UK under the 3663 First for Foodservice brand name.

This is the first step in Amphire's international expansion strategy, which joins two of the leading SaaS technology providers serving the food industry in North America and the United Kingdom. The deal brings several new technologies to Amphire's portfolio and includes the acquisition of Makella's on-going business, current customers and employees.

"The best option for accelerating Makella's growth was to allow the company to have complete independence from Bidvest," said Fred Barnes, chief executive officer of Bidvest Foodservice Europe. "We are rapidly expanding our business in the UK, Europe and internationally and share Amphire's vision of a single, independent technology provider leveraging its technology for the benefit of the entire foodservice industry. Amphire has a proven ability to acquire and assimilate companies through acquisition to achieve scale and sustainability of its business. We truly look forward to working with Amphire to continue to improve our business performance for shareholders."

"The acquisition of Makella gives Amphire the opportunity to expand our vision of a single supply chain trading platform conducting transactions in the foodservice industry," said Mark Barnekow, president and chief executive officer of Amphire Solutions Inc. "The Makella team is a group of seasoned supply chain and technology professionals working in the foodservice industry. Their expertise will greatly benefit our customers who value a single global technology provider in the emerging SaaS transaction space. In combination, we will be serving over 700 suppliers, 175 distributors and 100,000 operator end users together."

As the first international agreement for Amphire and Makella, the acquisition brings a powerful combination of multi-tenant SaaS systems together in a combined offering that includes transaction management, procurement and collaboration software and services.

"While we do believe that there are opportunities to consolidate the smaller players in the UK and Europe, the combination of Amphire and Makella gives us a true platform for expansion, said Liam Taylor, managing director of Makella. "Amphire had great success with its acquisitions in America, and we viewed that as a sign that together with Amphire's management team we could make a global deal work."

SOURCE: Amphire Solutions Inc.