IBM has announced a definitive agreement to acquire Confluent for $31 per share in cash, representing an enterprise value of $11 billion. Confluent provides an open-source enterprise data streaming platform built on Apache Kafka and supports more than 6,500 clients worldwide. The acquisition aims to strengthen IBM’s hybrid cloud and AI strategy by combining Confluent’s real-time data streaming technology with IBM’s AI and automation software.
Arvind Krishna, IBM Chairman, President and CEO, said, “IBM and Confluent together will enable enterprises to deploy generative and agentic AI better and faster by providing trusted communication and data flow between environments, applications, and APIs.” IBM expects the acquisition to improve data connectivity across hybrid cloud environments, meeting rising demand as new applications and AI agents rely on trustworthy, real-time data.
Confluent’s capabilities, including Data Streaming, Stream Governance, Stream Processing, and deployment options such as Confluent Cloud and Confluent Platform, will support IBM’s Data and Automation portfolio. Jay Kreps, CEO and Co-Founder of Confluent, added, “We are excited by the potential to join IBM and to accelerate our strategy with IBM’s go-to-market expertise, global scale and extensive portfolio.”