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Business briefs: Certegy sale, tech talk and more


Fidelity National Information Services took a loss when it sold Certegy Check Services, its St. Petersburg-based subsidiary.

Variant Equity Advisors LLC, an investment management firm, bought Certegy two months ago. Terms were not disclosed at the time.

But Jacksonville-based FIS (NYSE: FIS) discussed the sale in a quarterly filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday.

“Effective August 31, 2018, FIS sold substantially all the assets of the Certegy Check Services business unit, resulting in a pre-tax loss of $54 million, including goodwill distributed through the sale of business of $43 million,” the filing said.

Certegy, formerly Equifax Check Services, had been an FIS subsidiary since 2006. It’s now an independently operated company. Certegy provides payment risk management and services to retailers and financial institutions in North America.

New chairman

One of the Tampa Bay area’s best-known entrepreneurs, Tony DiBenedetto, has been named board chairman of CCG Analytics, an analytic and data management consulting firm in Tampa.

Tony DiBenedetto

DiBenedetto co-founded and was CEO of Tribridge, a software company in Tampa that grew to $175 million in revenue before it sold to DXC Technology Co. (NYSE: DXC) in 2017, in one of the more successful exits recently in the Tampa Bay tech community.

CCG wants to tap DiBenedetto’s experience as it shifts its business model. The company has developed industry-specific cloud solutions built on the Microsoft Azure platform and is slated to launch its first product for the retail vertical early next year. Additional solutions for the financial services, education and healthcare industries are currently in development, the company said.

CCG has solid leadership, talented team members and a business philosophy that puts people first — all elements of a great company, DiBenedetto said. “There is no better company in the space than CCG to provide what has been missing in the landscape: the ability to turn data into true actionable business insights.”

CG has more than 100 employees throughout the Southeast and expects to hire 50 software developers, architects and consults over the next year to support its revenue goal of $35 million by 2020. The company also plans to expand its geographic footprint, including high-demand markets such as Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas and Washington, D.C.

Cyber report

Corporate boards of directors have heard the message loud and clear that “cybersecurity is a risk,” and they are actively initiating more discussion about breaches and threats that could upend their organizations.

That’s one of the conclusions of the new Cyber Balance Sheet Report from Focal Point Data Risk in Tampa.

The new study shows that wider awareness of risks — such as third-party data breaches, ransomware and geopolitical conflicts — spurs more security dialogue in the boardroom. However, C-suite and security leaders struggle to frame risk in productive decision-making terms and keep an eye on whether companies are operating within their proper risk appetite, Focal Point said.

The full report can be downloaded here.

Lending options

Raymond James Financial Inc. (NYSE: RJF) has created a new business unit to provide lending services to middle-market clients.

The new Credit Finance unit can provide deal financing to acquisitions, recapitalizations, refinancing and growth capital. Funds managed by credit investors such as Black Rock will lend $50 million to $300 million per transaction, the company said.

The new unit is headed by Raj Singh, vice chairman of Raymond James Investment Banking and a 17-year veteran of the St. Petersburg-based financial services company.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



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