Having made its own string of acquisitions in recent years, Australian IT services and consulting firm Seisma is now reportedly up for grabs, in a sale which could fetch up to $300 million.

According to the AFR, Seisma’s private equity backers Liverpool Partners have engaged Macquarie Capital for a targeted sale process of the business after buying it from PS&C back in 2020 for a tick over $20 million.

Since then, Seisma has bolted on a string of digital companies in Australia and New Zealand, starting out with coIB shortly after the investment from Liverpool Partners and most recently adding cybersecurity & risk consultancy Q1 Group.

“This is a strategic move to enhance Seisma’s capabilities to better serve its clients in an increasingly complex digital landscape,” the firm said of its latest pick up. “The Q1 acquisition brings together both organisations’ expertise and resources, positioning Seisma as a full-service IT professional services provider for businesses seeking premier end-to-end IT services and solutions.”

In addition to cloud consultancy coIB in Melbourne, other acquisitions over the past four years include Perth-based advisory Braestone and Salesforce specialist Smartapps in back-to-back deals in 2021, followed by New Zealand’s Fronde and AI specialist Data Addiction of Sydney in another double last year – altogether growing its headcount to in excess of 400 consultants and engineers.

As per the AFR, the consultancy has now pushed its EBITDA close to $25 million, with the publication suggesting a potential $300 million-plus price-tag on the basis that IT networks typically go for between 12 to 15 times their earnings. While Seisma hasn’t fully disclosed the cost of its acquisitions, even a sum well south of the AFR’s numbers should represent a healthy pay-day for Liverpool.

Previous reports put the private equity firm’s outlay at around $22 million for a controlling stake, while former owner PS&C looks to have paid between roughly $11 million to $14 million for the company two year earlier. The AFR seems to have mistakenly reported this figure as the Liverpool investment, but again, either way, the return on yet another IT consulting ‘roll-up’ appears promising.

One such company – CyberCX – which has made somewhere in the order of one and a half dozen acquisitions since being formed by private equity firm BGH Capital in just 2019 and since grown its headcount to 1,500 or so, was also said by the paper to be up for sale earlier this year, with Telstra among those believed to be lining up despite a potential eye-watering cost of $1.5 billion.