Foley’s SPAC in $7.3B Deal to Take Blackstone’s Benefits Firm Alight Public

A blank-check firm backed by prominent investor Bill Foley has agreed to take Alight Solutions LLC, the U.S. benefits services provider owned by buyout firm Blackstone Group, public in a deal valued at $7.3 billion, the companies said on Monday.

Reuters was first to report on Sunday that Foley Trasimene Acquisition Corp was nearing a deal to take Alight public.

The deal includes an investment of $1.55 billion from a number of investors, including a $250 million investment from Cannae Holdings Inc, and a $150 million investment from Fidelity National Title Insurance Co., Chicago Title Insurance Co. and Commonwealth Land Title Insurance Co.

Foley Trasimene’s shares rose 9.4% in premarket trading.

The merged company plans to list on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “ALIT.”

Based in Lincolnshire, Illinois, Alight offers cloud-based benefits administration and human resources services to businesses, including 70% of the Fortune 100 companies, in 188 countries, according to its website.

It was acquired by Blackstone in 2017 from insurance broker Aon, in a deal that valued it at up to $4.8 billion.

Blackstone pursued an $800 million initial public offering of Alight two years ago, but abandoned the effort amid concerns it would not fetch the terms it was seeking.

A SPAC is a shell company that raises money in an IPO to merge with a privately held company that then becomes publicly traded as a result.

The deal comes on the heels of another blank-check merger involving Blackstone and a Foley SPAC in recent weeks. The private equity firm and its peer CVC Capital Partners said last month they would merge Paysafe Group with Foley Trasimene Acquisition Corp II in a transaction that valued the payments processor at $9 billion.

(Reporting by Anirban Sen in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)