Francisco Partners, Golden Gate Capital and Thoma Cressey Equity Partners Complete Acquisition of WRQ, Inc

Business Wire, Dec 29, 2004

SEATTLE -- An investment group consisting of Francisco Partners, Golden Gate Capital and Thoma Cressey Equity Partners today announced that it has completed the acquisition of WRQ, Inc., a developer of software for accessing and integrating legacy applications. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"WRQ has a wealth of assets, including loyal customers, deep technology, marketing and sales expertise, and a very strong executive team. Our investment in the company provides continued opportunities for its growth and market leadership," said David Golob, partner at Francisco Partners.

Founded and based in Seattle since 1981, WRQ serves over six million customers worldwide with its WRQ Reflection(R) and WRQ Verastream(R) product lines.

"This acquisition comes at a very exciting time for WRQ," said Shaun Wolfe, president and CEO of WRQ. "We will finish 2004 with strong sales growth and net profit. Our strong financial performance combined with new investment resources and expertise creates a powerful force to deliver business value to customers."

About WRQ

WRQ(R) builds software for accessing and integrating legacy applications. WRQ Reflection(R) software provides a broad range of terminal-emulation and PC X-server solutions. WRQ Verastream(R) integration server provides a single platform for reusing legacy logic and data in web applications, CRM applications, or portals. Our products help companies get the most from their hosts today as they advance their long-term IT strategy. Established in 1981, WRQ is one of the largest privately held software companies in the U.S. It has over six million users worldwide and the highest customer-support rating in the industry. Three out of four of Global 500 companies rely on WRQ daily.

About Francisco Partners

With $2.5 billion of committed capital, Francisco Partners is one of the world's largest technology-focused private equity funds. The firm was founded to pursue structured investments in technology companies undergoing strategic, technological, and operational inflection points. Francisco Partners targets majority and minority investments in private companies, public companies, and divisions of public companies, with transaction values ranging from $30 million to $2.0 billion. The principals of Francisco Partners have a proven track record, having invested in excess of $3.0 billion of equity capital in over 50 technology companies. For additional information, visit www.franciscopartners.com.

About Golden Gate Capital

Golden Gate Capital (www.goldengatecap.com) is a San Francisco-based private equity investment firm with approximately $2.5 billion of capital under management. Golden Gate is dedicated to partnering with world class management teams to invest in change-intensive, growth businesses. They target investments of up to $100 million in situations where there is a demonstrable opportunity to significantly enhance a company's value. The principals of Golden Gate have a long and successful history of investing with management partners across a wide rage of industries and transaction types, including leveraged buyouts, recapitalizations, corporate divestitures and spin-offs, build-ups and venture stage investing.

About Thoma Cressey Equity Partners

Thoma Cressey Equity Partners is a leading private equity investment firm that has been providing equity and strategic support to experienced management teams building growing companies for almost 25 years. The firm originated the concept of "industry consolidation" or "buy & build" investing, which seeks to create value through the strategic use of acquisitions to accelerate business growth. Thoma Cressey's investment focus is on profitable, middle-market companies in the software, healthcare, business services and consumer products and services industries. The firm provides equity capital for buyouts, MBOs, growth equity investments, and going private transactions. More information about TCEP can be found at www.thomacressey.com.

Copyright (C) 2004 WRQ, Inc. All rights reserved. WRQ, the WRQ logo, Reflection, Verastream, and "Access. Integrate. Transform." are either registered trademarks or trademarks of WRQ, Inc., in the USA and other countries. Some Reflection products include software developed by the OpenSSL Project for use in the OpenSSL Toolkit (http://www.openssl.org). All other trademarks, trade names, or company names referenced herein are used for identification only and are the property of their respective owners. USA patents pending.