Eka announced this morning that they had purchased Calgary-based EnCompass Technologies. According to the press release, “All employees of EnCompass have joined Eka, and the two co-founders, CEO Andy Bout and COO Stewart Brightman, will take key leadership roles in the combined organization. Andy and Stewart will be instrumental in driving further product development and accelerating customer adoption.”
Eka has emerged as a very strong competitor in the Ags and Metals markets, with numerous customers around the globe and particular strength in the AsiaPac region, and the company has been working to build-out additional capabilities in energy. However, as experience has shown, each commodity class has unique and complex requirements that require substantial investment in time and capital. With this acquisition, Eka can quickly move their energy strategy forward as Encompass has been singularly focused in energy and has a number of high profile customers, including EDF in North America. That being said, Encompass has not yet ventured outside of the North American markets, but in joining with with Eka, they will now have access to an international sales team and established channels to grow their business in AsiaPac and Europe.
As with any acquisition, the functional overlap of the products is always a question. Again, while Eka was building energy functionality, Encompass clearly has the more mature and deeper capabilities in gas and power, with emerging capabilities in liquid hydrocarbons. Additionally, the company has also worked with their client base to build out significant capabilities in Dodd Frank reporting for the US markets. So, while there will be some overlap, the smart money would be on Eka adopting Encompass’ product set as their go-forward solution for energy.