Cisco buys app performance management company AppDynamics for $3.7 billion ahead of expected IPO

Cisco today announced that it has acquired AppDynamics, an application performance management (APM) software company that had filed to go public just last month, for $3.7 billion.

The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of Cisco’s 2017 fiscal year, according to a statement.

The move is rare and surprising; earlier today AppDynamics raised the price range for its shares from $10-12 to $12-14. AppDynamics was aiming to raise as much as $193.2 million in the deal.

AppDynamics was planning to start trading on the Nasdaq Global Select market on January 26, according to Nasdaq’s website.

“Together with Cisco’s industry leading digital network architecture, customers will now have unprecedented end to end insight across their technology stack, from infrastructure to application,” Cisco corporate development head Rob Salvagno wrote in a blog post. “With this insight, companies will be equipped to improve customer experiences and accelerate revenue opportunities. The acquisition of AppDynamics also supports Cisco’s strategic transition toward software-centric solutions that deliver predictable recurring revenue.”

The move broadens further the capabilities of Cisco, which specializes in data center networking hardware. Cisco bought Internet of Things (IoT) company Jasper for $1.4 billion last year.

AppDynamics competitor New Relic went public in 2014. AppDynamics has striven to challenge New Relic and incumbents with a cloud service as well as on-premises software.

AppDynamics chief executive David Wadhwani will remain in charge and will report to Cisco’s Rowan Trollope.