Clearwater Analytics to acquire Beacon and Blackstone’s Bistro

Clearwater Analytics (CWAN) announced two strategic acquisitions, marking a major step toward transforming investment management technology. Clearwater has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Beacon, a next-generation leader for cross-asset class modeling and risk analytics for derivatives, private credit and debt, structured products and other alternative assets. Integrated with Wilshire’s equities and fixed income risk capabilities, this powerful engine enables portfolio modeling and risk management, addressing the growing focus on private and alternative assets. With institutional investors now allocating nearly 20% of their portfolios to alternatives, the need for sophisticated risk solutions has never been greater. Beacon’s platform provides complete transparency, openness and extensibility and is used by some of the most sophisticated financial firms including PIMCO, Blackstone, multi-strategy hedge funds, insurance asset managers, banks and energy traders. Clearwater also announced a definitive asset purchase agreement to acquire Bistro, Blackstone’s (BX) proprietary portfolio visualization software platform built for Blackstone’s Credit & Insurance business. As the world’s largest alternative asset manager, Blackstone developed Bistro to support the growth of its insurance clients and provide a comprehensive view of private credit portfolios, including asset analytics, client reporting, and risk management insights. Two key foundational pillars of the Bistro platform are Clearwater and Beacon, and tight integration with these platforms has been-and continues to be-a core architectural construct. Clearwater will acquire Beacon for an aggregate purchase price of approximately $560M, 60% of which will be paid in cash, with the remainder to be paid in shares of Clearwater Class A common stock valued at approximately $30.05 per share. With ARR of approximately $44M at the end of 2024, this platform has scale and market acceptance as a leading risk and modeling platform. The purchase price for the Bistro software is $125M, of which $10M will be paid in cash and the remainder will be paid in shares of Class A common stock, valued at $30.00 per share. This transaction represents the purchase of a platform developed by Blackstone. Clearwater will use the proceeds from its previously committed $800M Term Loan B, cash on hand, and a portion of its $200M revolving line of credit to fund the acquisitions of Beacon and Bistro and the previously announced acquisition of Enfusion.