Irish fin tech start up Taxamo has been sold to US rival Vertex in a $200m (€165m) all cash deal.

Taxamo was set up in 2015 by John McCarthy, whose family own the huge Fexco business also run from Killorglin.

The business provides software used by companies in the online services sector to ensure their tax, including VAT on online sales, is compliant including when trading services across borders by using sophisticated location data. 

Vertex is a global provider of indirect tax software.

Taxamo is one of a number of start-up companies operating from Killorglin’s RDI Hub, it also has offices in Dublin and San Francisco.

Taxamo founder and CEO John McCarthy will join Vertex in a

senior leadership role  after the deal. 

The deal comes a year after Taxamo struck what it called at the time a “game changing” collaboration with Deloitte to launch an automated tax compliance service enabling online marketplaces and sellers to register for VAT, automatically determine the correct VAT treatment of sales, submit VAT returns and remit payments of VAT to tax authorities.

Vertex CEO David DeStefano said Taxamo’s cloud-based solutions are: “purpose-built for today’s global, e-commerce businesses that need to automate compliance and commerce across the entire value chain of cross-border transactions from merchant to seller to payer and revenue authority."

“This acquisition supports and accelerates our growth strategies across e-commerce platforms and marketplaces in the enterprise and mid-market in Europe and North America, and among our existing global customers,” added

John McCarthy said Taxamo is based on a vision that as the global economy grows, more companies will need to pay more taxes in more countries.

"This causes challenges for both business and government, and it is these challenges that we have sought to understand and craft innovative solutions for.”