8:21 am, February 21, 2025
Pinewood Technologies has revealed plans to acquire Dubai-based automotive AI business Seez in a deal worth around £33.3m.
The business, which used to form part of dealer group Pendragon, has been a minority investor in Seez since September 2024.
But now it intends to acquire the remaining 90.9% share and expects the deal to be completed on March 19, 2025.
The acquisition will see Pinewood develop important AI tools to its product range for UK customers, ‘potentially saving years of development work’, said analysts Zeus Capital, along with better meeting the demands of North American dealer groups.
Seez is an AI and ML (machine learning) SaaS (software as a service) platform offering AI Chatbot and a raft of e-commerce and omnichannel products to car dealer groups worldwide.
In the announcement to the London Stock Exchange on Thursday (Feb 20), Pinewood said the board of Lithia Motors (which now owns Pendragon) is ‘supportive’ of the acquisition, and will deploy Seez’s chatbot products to its dealerships globally.
Bill Berman, CEO of Pinewood Technologies Group, said: ‘Since making our strategic investment in Seez in September 2024, we have made strong progress together and the full acquisition of the business is a compelling opportunity to build on this early success.
‘Seez is an outstanding company that has developed highly sophisticated AI and machine learning products that are increasingly critical tools for the automotive retail market and they are highly complementary to our own Automotive Intelligence Platform.
‘This transaction supports the delivery of the strategy we set out in October 2024 and it will significantly enhance our customer proposition.’
Tarek Kabrit, CEO and co-founder of Seez, said: ‘We are thrilled to join forces with Pinewood at such a pivotal moment in the automotive industry.
‘By combining our advanced AI-driven solutions with Pinewood’s proprietary data and deep dealer integrations, we are creating a next-generation platform that will empower dealerships with smarter, more efficient tools to drive growth.’
Kabrit added: ‘This acquisition not only accelerates Pinewood’s expansion into the North American market but also enables us to collectively redefine how dealers interact with technology, streamline operations, and enhance customer experiences.
‘The future of automotive retail is intelligent, autonomous, and data-driven-together, and we couldn’t have asked for a better partner to make that future a reality.’
Zeus said it would update its forecasts once the deal has been completed next month, but suggested it expects around a 15% uplift in Pinewood’s FY25 revenue and no change to underlying EBITDA, while FY26 revenue will be around 25% higher and underlying EBITDA to be lifted by around 21%.
Announcement of the acquisition follows news earlier this week that Pinewood Technologies has agreed a landmark five-year deal with Lookers owner Global Auto Holdings (GAH) to roll out its Automotive Intelligence platform at dealerships across the world.
