Czech DEK owner Vít Kutnar sells software arm for 1bn crowns

Vít Kutnar, owner of DEK, the largest Czech building-materials retailer, is selling three software companies — ÚRS CZ, Callida and First Information Systems — to the investment firm MidEuropa. According to an estimate by the e15 news server, the deal is worth more than one billion crowns.

The companies being sold handle pricing, cost estimates and the management of construction projects; their products are used by contractors, developers, quantity surveyors and public authorities in Czechia and Slovakia. At the heart of the platform is ÚRS's own pricing database, which has become the standard tool for construction cost estimation in the country.

According to e15, the three companies generated consolidated revenue of 420 million crowns last year and, thanks to margins in the tens of percent, were the most profitable part of the DEK group. The parties expect the deal to close in the second half of this year, with DEK anticipating settlement as early as September. The financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

Kutnar says the sale reflects his wish to focus on DEK's core business — the distribution and manufacture of building materials, equipment rental and related services. In a letter to employees, he noted that the group will now direct its capital and management attention toward expanding its branch network, logistics and technology.

MidEuropa, for its part, plans to build a regional software platform on top of the acquired assets, investing in product development, AI-based features and possible further acquisitions. According to fund partner Marek Rodák, the value of the companies lies above all in local data and processes embedded in customers' everyday work.

For DEK, the sale closes a chapter the group had been building for several years: it acquired ÚRS in 2020 and gradually assembled a portfolio of software products around it, turning the asset into the leader of the Czech construction-estimation market. DEK itself, however, remains the country's largest building-materials retailer — last year it had 143 stores in Czechia and Slovakia, more than five thousand employees, revenue of 33 billion crowns and EBITDA of 3.1 billion crowns.

By the Around Prague newsroom