JACKSONVILLE, Fla.—FIS has agreed to buy Worldpay for $35 billion, with the U.S. financial services provider striking the biggest deal to date in the fast-growing electronic payments industry, Reuters reported.
“The financial technology sector is consolidating fast, with global payments set to reach $3 trillion a year in revenue by 2023 as more people switch from cash to digital payments for online and high street sales,” stated Reuters, citing data from McKinsey.
"Scale matters in our rapidly changing industry," said FIS Chief Executive Gary Norcross, who will lead the new, combined organization.
The FIS deal, valuing Worldpay at about $43 billion including debt, comes a little more than a year after U.S. firm Vantiv paid $10.63 billion for the payments firm, which was set up in Britain and spun off from Royal Bank of Scotland, Reuters noted.