AVEVA CEO Richard Longdon said it was business as usual at the Cambridge technology business after a second round of takeover talks with French company Schneider Electric were aborted last night.

AVEVA immediately applied for the suspension of its shares to be lifted in the UK from 8 this morning and they opened to a resounding cry of ‘non merci’ from shareholders – the share price opening almost 17 per cent (308.50p) down.

The stock had been driven to a new high by speculation that the takeover talks had been revived but the entente cordiale looks to have been firmly shredded.

It is the second time in under six months that talks between the parties have ended in failure. 

No reason was given for the collapse of the revised deal but AVEVA has made it abundantly clear that it would not tolerate putting the interests of shareholders at risk in any deal.

The reverse takeover would have seen Schneider inject a huge amount of capital into AVEVA with Longdon retaining control of an enlarged software group headquartered in Cambridge worth £3 billion and employing 3,500 people.

It is no secret that Longdon has steered a strategy of diversifying the group’s products and services to minimise the risk of dependancy on oil & gas, given macro-economic circumstances.

It is a policy that is already bringing return on investment and making AVEVA a highly attractive target for corporations with deep pockets.