Citrix Agrees to Buy Slack Competitor Wrike for $2.25 Billion

(Bloomberg) -- Citrix Systems Inc. has agreed to buy Wrike Inc. for $2.25 billion in cash to add collaboration software to its products serving remote workers.

The deal, expected to close in the first half of the year, will be “modestly dilutive” to Citrix’s earnings in 2021, Citrix said in a statement on Tuesday, confirming an earlier Bloomberg News report.

Secure work-collaboration software has grown in popularity as businesses have increasingly relied on remote work since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. That trend has fueled growth at Wrike and its competitors including Asana Inc., Atlassian Corp.’s Trello and Slack Technologies Inc.

Wrike, owned by the technology-focused buyout firm Vista Equity Partners, was founded by Andrew Filev in 2006 and is also backed by Bain Capital Ventures and Scale Venture Partners.

Citrix will fund the deal with new debt and cash. It’s secured a $1.45 billion bridge loan from JPMorgan Chase & Co. JPMorgan advised Citrix on the deal while San Jose, California-based Wrike worked with Goldman Sachs Group Inc.