Advised Carlyle Cardinal on the sale of its portfolio company, Payzone, one of Ireland’s largest providers of payment solutions, to AIB Group and First Data Corporation 
-Payzone is one of Ireland’s leading providers of payment solutions, facilitating the digitalisation of consumer payments by cash, card and card-not-present for every day consumer needs
-Payzone has a strong track record of delivering innovation and new product development with a suite of solutions that allows large and small businesses and non-profit organisations to accept payments online, in store, on the road or over the phone
-Under the ownership of Carlyle Cardinal, the business developed a highly diversified, multi-channel platform, enabling it to successfully leverage the Payzone brand and achieve robust growth from expanding into new verticals and product offerings
-The company today serves in excess of 300,000 registered consumers with over 7,000 merchants throughout Ireland and processes 115m+ transactions annually
-AIB and First Data Corporation (FDC) formed a new joint venture to acquire Payzone
-The joint venture is majority owned by AIB (75%) with First Data (25%) being the minority owner
-AIB provides digitally enabled banking and financial products and services to retail, business and corporate customers in Ireland and the United Kingdom
-First Data Corporation provides commerce enabled technology and solutions for merchants, financial institutions, and card issuers in North America, EMEA and APAC
-The investment is consistent with AIB’s strategy to make selective investments that strengthen their customer service and product proposition in their core market
-The deal will further evolve AIB and First Data’s digital product proposition, customer service offering, and overall payments footprint in the Irish market
-It will allow AIB to build out further fintech capability to strengthen their position as Ireland’s leading digitally-enabled bank while also differentiating itself in a post PSD2/Open Banking economy by offering customers additional choice and convenience
-Payzone, in partnership with the newly formed joint venture, will continue to operate independently to serve and grow its core Irish market while also exploring new growth avenues in online payments from the now strengthened value proposition
-Arma focused on (1) carefully developing the equity story, highlighting the strategic importance of the solutions and the strong growth potential; (2) preparing a detailed financial model; (3) creating marketing materials, including teaser, management presentation and tailored materials for meetings with potential buyers; (4) coordinating the preparation of vendor due diligence reports; and (5) negotiating the transaction terms in a complex situation given the counterparties involved