Azul Announces Strategic Investment from Thoma Bravo
Investment to accelerate growth and innovation of the world’s most trusted enterprise Java platform
Existing investors Vitruvian Partners and Lead Edge Capital to make new investments and retain significant minority stakes in Azul
Bengaluru – November 2025 – Azul, the only company 100% focused on Java, today
announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to receive a majority
strategic investment from Thoma Bravo, a leading software investment firm. As part of the transaction,
Azul’s existing investors Vitruvian Partners and Lead Edge Capital will be reinvesting significant new capital
and will retain minority stakes alongside Azul’s employees.
Azul provides industry-leading Java runtime
solutions that deliver superior performance, security, and cost efficiency for
enterprise applications. Its products – Platform Core, Platform Prime, the
company’s high-performance Java platform, and Intelligence Cloud – help
organizations run Java workloads faster, safer and more economically across
hybrid and cloud environments. Azul’s growing customer base includes 36% of the
Fortune 100 and the world’s ten largest banks, as well as many other highly
regarded global businesses. This strategic investment from Thoma Bravo will
support Azul’s continued growth to meet the rising demand for high-performance
Java platforms, scale its engineering efforts, accelerate innovation in runtime
performance, observability and security tooling, and expand its reach in global
enterprise and cloud markets.
“We’re thrilled to welcome Thoma Bravo at this
exciting time for our company and the Java ecosystem,” said Scott Sellers, co-founder and CEO of Azul. “Thoma Bravo
brings the scale, resources, and expertise that align seamlessly with Azul’s
vision and aspirations, strengthening our confidence in the significant growth
opportunities ahead. We are grateful for their investment as well as for the
continued backing from Vitruvian and Lead Edge. Together, we’ll accelerate our
global growth, advance innovation across our platforms and deliver even greater
value to our customers.”
“As enterprises move away from legacy Java
offerings and face rising cloud infrastructure costs, demand for Azul’s
enterprise-ready, scalable, secure and cost-efficient Java solutions has never
been stronger,” said Adam Solomon, a partner at Thoma Bravo.
“Azul’s superior technology foundation and
talented and established team position the company for accelerated growth at
this dynamic time in the Java market. We are excited to support Azul as they
build on their impressive history of growth and leadership,” added Chandler
Gay, a vice president at Thoma Bravo.
“We’re
very proud of the partnership we have formed with the Azul executive team to
help deliver strong and consistent global growth over the past five years and
are delighted to continue supporting Azul in its next chapter,” said Sophie
Bower-Straziota, partner at Vitruvian Partners. “We are excited to welcome
Thoma Bravo as Azul’s new majority owner and to deepen our commitment as Azul
builds on its track record of exceptional results and success and pursues the
significant opportunities ahead.”
Goodwin Procter LLP is serving as legal advisor
and William Blair is serving as financial advisor to Thoma Bravo. Kirkland
& Ellis LLP is serving as legal advisor and Guggenheim Securities, LLC is
serving as financial advisor to Azul. Debt financing for the transaction is
being provided by funds affiliated with Ares Management LLC.
About Azul Systems (“Azul”)
Headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, Azul
provides the Java platform for the modern cloud enterprise. Azul is the only
company 100% focused on Java. Millions of Java developers, hundreds of millions
of devices and the world’s most highly regarded businesses trust Azul to power
their applications with exceptional capabilities, performance, security, value,
and success. Azul customers include 36% of the Fortune 100, 50% of Forbes top
10 World’s Most Valuable Brands,10 of the world’s top 10 banks and leading
brands like Avaya, Bazaarvoice, BMW, Deutsche Telekom, LG, Mastercard, Mizuho,
Priceline, Salesforce, Software AG, and Workday. Learn more at azul.com
and follow us @azulsystems.
About Thoma Bravo
Thoma Bravo is one of the largest
software-focused investors in the world, with over US$181 billion in assets
under management as of June 30, 2025. Through its private equity and credit
strategies, the firm invests in growth-oriented, innovative companies operating
in the software and technology sectors. Leveraging Thoma Bravo's deep sector
knowledge and strategic and operational expertise, the firm collaborates with
its portfolio companies to implement operating best practices and drive growth
initiatives. Over the past 20+ years, the firm has acquired or invested in
approximately 555 companies representing approximately US$285 billion in
enterprise value (including control and non-control investments). The firm has
offices in Chicago, Dallas, London, Miami, New York and San Francisco. For more
information, visit Thoma Bravo's website at thomabravo.com.
About Vitruvian Partners
Vitruvian Partners is a global growth-focused
investor with offices across London, Miami, San Francisco, Stockholm, Munich,
Madrid, Luxembourg, Mumbai, Singapore and Shanghai. Vitruvian focuses on
dynamic situations characterized by rapid growth and change across asset-light
industries. Vitruvian has over $20 billion of active funds which have backed
many leaders in their sectors, including Just Eat, Arrive, Skyscanner, Marqeta,
Wise, Global-e, CFC, Darktrace, and Bitdefender. Further information can be found
at www.vitruvianpartners.com
About Lead Edge Capital
Lead Edge Capital is a $5 billion growth equity
firm investing in software, internet, and tech-enabled businesses globally. The
firm has invested in a number of major software and internet companies around
the world, including Alibaba Group, Arrive Logistics, Asana, Azul Systems,
Bazaarvoice, Benchling, Clearscore, Duo Security, Grafana, GrowthZone,
Holistiplan, LeanStaffing, LiveView Technologies, Pacemate, Safesend, Signal
Sciences, Tempo, Toast, Wise, and YouSign. One of the main drivers of Lead Edge’s
success is its unique investor base, a network of 700+ executives,
entrepreneurs, and dealmakers who have built and run some of the world’s most
successful companies. In addition to providing flexible capital, Lead Edge
leverages this global advisory group to connect portfolio companies with the
customers, partners, talent, and advisors needed to accelerate growth. Lead
Edge Capital was founded in 2011 and has offices in New York City, London and
Santa Barbara.

