Report: Buyout firms in bid for NCR

Two big investment firms are making a joint bid of more than $10 billion for Duluth-based financial technology giant NCR, Reuters reported Tuesday.

NCR declined to comment on “rumor or speculation,” but reports of a possible buyout of the Fortune 500 company or some of its assets have circulated for months.

New ownership could cloud the future of NCR’s planned move to a new Midtown Atlanta headquarters near Georgia Tech. Leveraged buyout groups — which buy firms with debt and take them private— often look to slash costs, sell assets and take on new business models or products to improve performance.

Tuesday’s report by Reuters, which cited unnamed people, was the most specific report on a potential sale to date and outlined other possible suitors.

It said private equity giants Blackstone Group and Carlyle Group are partners in the joint bid. The report pushed NCR shares up 10.7 percent Tuesday to $34.73 a share.

NCR, which makes automated tellers, travel kiosks and cash registers, has been under shareholder pressure to improve performance. Under CEO Bill Nuti the company has been transforming from a hardware-centric business into more of a software and consulting company. But the transition hasn’t been smooth.

In April, the Wall Street Journal reported NCR was exploring options, including selling assets, boosting its dividends or making other moves that might make its stock and balance sheet more appealing.

Last week, Nuti declined to comment about the company’s analysis of strategic alternatives or reports that it could put itself or major assets on the auction block. In the interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Nuti said he is focused on transforming the company and its offerings into becoming an end-to-end service for merchants and consumers.

NCR earlier this year announced it intends to move its headquarters from Gwinnett into a new $260 million headquarters complex in Midtown, as first reported in the AJC.

A satellite suburban office site also is planned, and on Tuesday, Atlanta Business Chronicle reported NCR was in discussions for a site in Alpharetta.

Nuti said creating a hub for about 4,000 technology workers in Atlanta is a “bold, ambitious” move, but that he is committed to ways to help keep more graduates — and their high-paying jobs — local. Nuti said about half of Georgia Tech’s engineering graduates leave the state for jobs in northern California, Boston, Austin, Seattle and elsewhere.

The purported Blackstone-Carlyle acquisition would include NCR’s existing debt, Reuters reported. The news agency reported that a possible deal is several weeks from being finished, and that it’s uncertain if it will come together.