The announcement coincides with significant internal restructuring at the company
The company that created the open-source MariaDB relational database management system (RDBMS) has acknowledged receiving a preliminary offer from K1 Investment Management, located in California. This suggests that MariaDB is the target of another possible takeover attempt. The so-called "unsolicited non-binding indicative proposal" for MariaDB, which is an exploratory offer that is non-binding and subject to change based on the outcome of negotiations in the upcoming weeks, was privately disclosed by K1 on Friday. This proposal calls for purchasing all of MariaDB's shares at a price of $0.55 per share, or approximately $37 million based on the company's closing valuation on February 5. The specifics of this offer have not yet been determined.
The announcement coincides with significant internal restructuring at the company, including the departure of its geospatial and database-as-a-service divisions and the entry of a new CEO. According to the Irish Takeover Rules, which MariaDB is subject to because of the location of one of its headquarters (it has one in Dublin, Ireland, and another in Redwood City, California), K1 has until March 29, 2024, to either formalize its offer or abandon the plans completely. It's also important to note that the associated MariaDB Foundation, which oversees governance for the open-source MariaDB project, just signed a significant sponsorship agreement with Amazon Web Services (AWS), which may be significant given the problems at the for-profit MariaDB company.
