Compuware to acquire Gomez for $295 million

Compuware today announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Web application performance management vendor Gomez for $295 million.  Hottest tech M&A deals of 2009 The deal, expected to close in November, will augment Compuware's IT management software suite with Gomez's technology, which is designed to monitor and manage Web site and Web application performance. Executives from both companies point to complementary products and existing product integrations as a driver for the pending acquisition. "Together, Compuware and Gomez provide the industry's only unified application performance management solution, spanning the enterprise and Internet," said Compuware President and COO Bob Paul, in a press release. "For business and IT executives who are moving more business-critical applications onto the Internet, Compuware can now offer unified visibility, isolation and resolution of application performance problems from the data center to the customer. Gomez's 272 worldwide employees and management team, headquartered in Lexington, Mass., are expected to join Compuware, which is based in Detroit, after the close of the transaction.

Competitive offerings only cover isolated portions of the enterprise-Internet application delivery chain." Gomez executives say the deal will ultimately benefit the vendor's existing customers. "This agreement marks a fundamental breakthrough in how IT and business leaders can manage the performance of all the applications that drive their businesses," said Jaime Ellertson, Gomez CEO and president, in a statement. "The complementary nature of our products and our already-existing product integration will allow Compuware and Gomez to rapidly deliver dramatically extended value to our mutual customers." Compuware will be able to add Gomez's software-as-a-service business model to its own growing SaaS revenue, and Gomez will benefit from Compuware's research and development group, larger sales organization and geographic reach, company executives say. Follow me on Twitter. Do you Tweet?