Edenred has acquired employee engagement platform Reward Gateway in a £1.15 billion deal.
According to the companies, the move will “bring a unique and differentiated value proposition at scale to the market, by providing leading end-to-end employee services, from digital employee benefits, employee savings, recognition and rewards programmes, to wellbeing and corporate social animation solutions”.
The partnership will see Reward Gateway joining Edenred’s employee benefits division, which is led by Arnaud Erulin, Employee Benefits, COO. Reward Gateway’s global CEO Nick Burns will remain in his current position.
Erulin said: “This acquisition marks a major milestone in the roll-out of our strategic plan, putting Edenred in the best position to be the most trusted global employee benefits and engagement platform. It opens the door for Edenred to accelerate the strengthening of its employee benefits value proposition. This move offers global corporations and enterprises international consistency in every market that we operate in.”
The deal is expected to accelerate the delivery of a variety of solutions and extended the each of Reward Gateway’s platform into new countries and regions when it is rolled out in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Romania and Spain.
Nick Burns, global CEO of Reward Gateway, said: “As we will aim at a single unified platform, we will benefit from economies of scale to build tailored solutions for specific markets. Bringing together our collective strengths, from commercial reach to product innovation and advanced technology, will be putting us in a position to provide HR leaders with a truly market-beating solution.
“In the context of a post-pandemic world we have displaced workforces, and as the cost-of-living crisis continues, many employees are struggling to make ends meet. Employers too are extremely affected by market instability, in addition to other challenges such as inflation, staff retention and the war for talent. Our goal is to unite and connect people with organisations that are set up and armed to support their workforces. This deal solves the macro social issues that exist in today’s workforce.”
The deal is expected to close in the coming days.