Oracle Corp. Sunday said it will acquire Aconex Ltd., a Melbourne, Australia-based maker of cloud construction and engineering industry collaboration tools, for AU$1.6 billion ($1.19 billion).

Founded in 2000 as a company offering construction collaboration and procurement management services, Aconex subsequently pivoted into online collaboration services covering construction, infrastructure, power, mining, and oil and gas. Aconex’s fortunes very much reflected a massive mining boom in Australia in the period up to about 2015, seeing it become one of Australia’s top 200 publicly listed companies.

Although the company offers services globally, catering to 70,000 users in 70 countries, the end of the Australian mining boom saw the company’s fortunes wane somewhat. Aconex’s share price peaked in July 2016 at AU$8.28 before dropping as low as AU$3.08 by February this year. Its profits declined as construction in Australia dropped to a 16-year low.

The Oracle deal comes in at AU$7.80 a share, a 47 percent premium on Aconex’s ASX Ltd. closing price of AU$5.29 per share Friday.

Post-acquisition, Aconex’s platform will be integrated into the Oracle Construction and Engineering Cloud to provide an end-to-end offering for project management and delivery that enables customers to plan, build and operate construction projects.

“Delivering projects on time and on budget are the highest strategic imperatives for any construction and engineering organization,” Mike Sicilia, general manager of Oracle’s Construction and Engineering Global Business Unit, said in a statement. “With the addition of Aconex, we significantly advance our vision of offering the most comprehensive cloud-based project management solution for this $14 trillion industry.”

This isn’t Oracle’s first acquisition in the market. It acquired Textura Corp., an Illinois-based cloud provider that sells business automation services for the construction sector, for $663 million in April 2016.

The deal with Aconex is subject to shareholder approval. The company’s directors have unanimously recommended the offer, with a shareholder meeting being scheduled for March, meaning the deal is set to close in the first half of 2018.

Image: Aconex