Tech company with Tampa roots prepares to go public

AgileThought, a software and technology consulting firm with a major employee base in Tampa, plans to go public through a business combination with LIV Capital Acquisition Corp.

LIV is special purpose acquisition corporation, or a “blank check” company set up specifically to acquire another firm.

The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of 2021. After it closes, the combined company will operate as AgileThought and will remain listed on Nasdaq under the new ticker symbol “AGIL” with an expected market capitalization of about $491 million, a news release said.

AgileThought was founded in 2004 in Tampa and grew to one of the largest software firms and one of the largest privately held companies locally before it was acquired by AN Global, a technology firm in suburban Dallas, in July 2019. After the acquisition, the company kept the AgileThought name.

Related: AgileThought CEO: Why the company decided to sell and what’s ahead for local workers

Although headquartered in Texas, AgileThought still has 320 consultants in Tampa, an investor presentation said.

“We have a good portion of our footprint in terms of delivery in the U.S., mainly in the Tampa region. The Tampa and St. Petersburg region are fantastic locations to have a technology hub, and we augment that with capabilities throughout the Americas,” Manuel Senderos, who is now chairman and CEO of AgileThought, said in an investor presentation on May 10, when the deal was announced.

He also cited the talent pool in Mexico, where AgileThought has 1,470 consultants. The company is recruiting on average 100 consultants a month and expects that trend to continue through the end of the year, said Jorge Pliego, chief financial officer.

AgileThought is a pure-play digital solutions provider, creating software for very large, blue-chip customers, he said. The company expects to post $184 million in revenue in 2021.

LIV will fund the acquisition with $124 million from its own cash and investor funds.

SPACs have been a hot trend on Wall Street, CNBC reported earlier this year. Roughly 200 SPACs went public in 2020, raising about $64 billion in total funding, nearly as much as all of last year’s initial public offerings combined, according to CNBC.

The AgileThought deal is the most recent SPAC transaction locally.

Digital Media Solutions, a Clearwater digital marketing firm, became a public company through a merger in July 2020 with Leo Holdings, a blank check company. The company trades under the ticker symbol DMS on the New York Stock Exchange.

SPC & CO Healthcare Acquisition Company in Tampa became a blank check company in January, when it sold 23 million units of common stock and warrants. The company’s Class A common stock starting trading under the ticker SHAC on the Nasdaq Capital Market in March. The company intends to concentrate its efforts on identifying businesses in the healthcare technology industry or healthcare-related industries in the United States and other developed countries, it said.