Naples-based ACI Worldwide has announced a multimillion-dollar deal to acquire Western Union’s bill pay business.

The local company has agreed to buy Speedpay for $750 million in cash.

In a news release, ACI said the deal would unite two leading bill pay portfolios in the rapidly-evolving U.S. electronic bill pay market.

Combined, ACI and Speedpay would serve more than 4,000 customers across the country in such segments as consumer finance, insurance and health care.

The merger will not only allow ACI to increase its business, but give it an opportunity to accelerate innovation through more spending on research and development, the company said.

A unified bill payment platform will be developed to support billions of transactions.

By combining bill payment experts from both companies, ACI said it expects to have the ability to develop and deliver solutions that more efficiently address the needs of its customers. 

“This acquisition reinforces ACI’s ‘any payment, every possibility’ vision and accelerates our ability to capitalize on the growing global payment transaction opportunity over the next five years,” said Phil Heasley, ACI’s president and CEO, in a statement.

With more than 15 billion transactions in 2018, the U.S. bill pay market continues to grow at a steady pace, due to several factors, including increased adoption of digital and mobile payments by consumers.

The transaction will allow Western Union to concentrate its resources on its cross-border money movement strategies and to sell off a non-core asset for the benefit of its shareholders, said Hikmet Ersek, Western Union’s CEO, in a statement. 

“Our strategy remains focused on expanding our digital services, leveraging our platform to unlock new cross-border, cross-currency payments opportunities, and generating additional operating efficiencies,” he said.

In 2018, the Speedpay business generated more than $350 million in revenue and $90 million in adjusted earnings. 

The transaction is expected to close by the end of the second quarter, subject to regulatory approvals. 

In other news Thursday, ACI announced its fourth-quarter and year-end results for 2018. 

Previously: Naples-based ACI Worldwide reports increases in third-quarter revenue, profit

Last year new bookings increased 22 percent to $757 million, while total bookings grew 15 percent to $1.26 billion from 2017.

Cash flow from operations also rose, growing 26 percent from 2017 to 2018.

However, ACI did not deliver the revenue and earnings that it expected last year, in part due to what the company described as “unforeseen events that delayed certain contracts,” which are now anticipated to be realized this year.

The company reported revenue of about $1.01 billion for last year, down slightly from more than $1.02 billion in 2017. 

Earnings grew to $69 million, or 59 cents a share, up from $5 million, or 4 cents a share, a year ago. 

This year the company expects revenue to be between $1.1 billion and $1.125 billion, which would be an increase of 9 to 11 percent over 2018.

ACI anticipates its adjusted earnings to be in the range of $310 million to $325 million, representing a 24 to 29 percent growth over 2018.

Shares closed at $31.87 Thursday, up 69 cents, or more than 2.2 percent.