Advent International agrees to take McAfee private in a deal worth $14B, including about $4B in debt
An investor group led by buyout firms Advent International Corp., Permira Advisers and others agreed to take McAfee Corp. private in a deal that values the cybersecurity software maker at more than $14 billion including debt.
Context & Ripple Effects
McAfee had already separated its enterprise unit through a $4B sale to Symphony Technology Group, leaving the remaining company on a distinct ownership path. Its 2020 return to public markets had marked a prior step in that path.
The agreement confirms the advanced take-private talks reported a day earlier and places Advent and Permira at the next ownership transition for the remaining McAfee business.
First-order effects
- Advent International- and Permira-led investors will move McAfee from public to private ownership in a transaction valued at more than $14 billion, including roughly $4 billion of debt.
- On completion, Advent and Permira will control McAfee's remaining business while its capital structure incorporates the debt used in the transaction.
Second-order effects
- McAfee's former enterprise operation and its remaining business will sit with separate private-equity owners, extending the ownership split created by Symphony Technology Group's acquisition.
- McAfee's public-market listing will no longer provide an independently traded valuation for the company; Advent, Permira and the deal's lenders become its principal financial stakeholders.
Third-order effects
- If McAfee's sequence is repeated, cybersecurity vendors may be reshaped through carve-outs and recurring public-to-private transitions rather than kept as integrated public companies.
The trend: Private equity is becoming a recurring owner and reassembler of cybersecurity assets through divestitures, IPOs and take-private deals.