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Wolters Kluwer Law and Business has bought the UK and Ireland accountants division of MYOB for £35.5 million.
This means that the PerTAX family of tax software has moved to CCH, which produces the comprehensive ProSystem suite of tax and accounting software.
MYOB offers a complete range of accountancy software systems, which have historically been targeted at the top 500 accountancy practices. In 2007, these systems were integrated and aimed at the entire accountancy practice marketplace.
CCH Software serves practices of all sizes and is in use within practices ranging from sole practitioners to the top 100.
There are no plans to pull any products, said Martin Casimir of CCH, but ultimately the aim is to develop the 'best upper end product'.
He said that the acquisition has been 'defensive to some extent', as the software part of CCH's business was previously quite small. Buying MYOB lifts it to a new level.
The April 2008 versions of the software will be released as planned and the old MYOB premises at Hangar Lane will be kept on, at least for the time being. It will be 'evolution, not revolution', said Mr Casimir.
The acquisition shows that CCH is 'serious about its tax software'.
It is the second tax software deal to be completed in recent days. Last week, the award-winning Digita was taken over by global rival Thomson Corporation.
