You are Marta Salgado, 44, Head of Corporate Development at Fluvento Digital, a logistics-software group based in Lisbon. A rival has launched an AI forecasting module, three key customers want the same by 31 May 2027, and the board expects you to choose how to get it: buy, ally or build.
The situation
Fluvento sells logistics software to businesses: €180 million of annual recurring revenue, a 22% EBITDA margin, €70 million in cash and 1,150 employees. Three weeks ago its closest rival went live with an AI demand-forecasting module, and it has already signed two companies your sales team had courted for a year.
Three of your top-ten customers, €16 million of recurring revenue, have said their renewal depends on Fluvento offering the same by 31 May 2027, about twelve months away. The board has given you a mandate to close the gap however you judge best, with one firm condition: within 24 months of committing capital, the move must generate at least €12 million a year of run-rate value (new revenue and savings, net of integration cost), or the board will treat the money as wasted and claw it back.
Three folders sit on your desk, prices already filled in. Acquire NordCast AS, an Oslo specialist of 60 people, almost all researchers and engineers, with about €10 million of revenue and no profit yet: €95 million, roughly 9.5 times its revenue. Ally with the same NordCast to co-develop the module and share its revenue: €25 million over two years, without owning the technology or fully controlling its roadmap. Or build it in-house: €35 million, full ownership, and a realistic build time of 20 to 24 months.
The largest deal you have closed was a €15 million tuck-in. Four colleagues are seconded to you full time (the CFO, the COO, a new Head of Integration and the Head of People & Culture), and all five names will sit on the recommendation. But the only one the board will ask for, when it wants to know who made the call, is yours.