Houlihan Lokey Advises Lyanthe

Houlihan Lokey is pleased to announce that Lyanthe B.V. (Lyanthe), a portfolio company of the founders and Capital A Partners (Capital A), has been acquired by Visma Nederland B.V., a subsidiary of Norway-based Visma AS (Visma), the European leader in cloud software. The transaction was signed and closed on 4 March 2022.

This software and services company has offered a solution since 2012 that allows accounting and bookkeeping firms in the Netherlands and Belgium to automate their administrative processing. Through this acquisition, Visma offers a complete automated processing line—from invoice to accounting—for the accountancy sector.

Lyanthe was founded through a collaboration between accountants and IT specialists. By learning from its founders’ own experience in organising accounting processes, it has developed a solution that simplifies and automates everyday, repetitive tasks, enabling Lyanthe’s partners and customers to focus on the activities that make a difference for the entrepreneurs they serve. By using Lyanthe, an office can automate its accounting processes in such a way that 95% of the invoices are processed correctly without human intervention. The pre-accounting software books large numbers of invoices at row level quickly and consistently across administrations. This is made possible by Lyanthe’s proposition that combines technology and human validation in the digitisation of invoices.

Visma offers software and services that simplify and digitise business processes in the private and (semi) public sector. The Visma Group operates throughout Scandinavia, the Benelux, and Central and Eastern Europe. With more than 14,000 employees and net sales exceeding €1.7 billion in 2021, Visma is one of Europe’s leading software companies. In the Dutch and Belgian markets, Visma’s software offerings include solutions for financial management, HRM, procurement, and e-government. Visma Benelux consists of 36 companies, all focused on business-critical cloud software. Visma is also a proud sponsor of Team Jumbo-Visma, one of the world’s best cycling and skating teams.

Lyanthe will be added to Visma Connected Experience for accountants, a complete ecosystem of best-of-breed solutions that supports all activities within an accountancy firm. The software solutions are mutually integrated and allows accountants to use each other’s data. This reduces the processing time and minimises the chance of error due to double entry. The software enables accountancy firms in the Netherlands and Belgium to process more than 150,000 invoices daily, covering 120,000 administrations in seven countries.

Lyanthe will continue to operate with its current team under its own name as an independent entity within the Visma Group. All collaborations that Lyanthe has with software vendors and administrative service providers will continue and remain unchanged.

Houlihan Lokey served as the exclusive financial advisor to Lyanthe and its shareholders and assisted in initiating, structuring, and negotiating all aspects of the transaction. This deal represents another successful transaction for its team in the accounting automation space.