Thoma Bravo Closes $5.3 Billion Darktrace Acquisition Weeks After Founding Investor Mike Lynch’s Death

Thoma Bravo has completed its $5.3 billion acquisition of British cybersecurity group Darktrace, ending a tumultuous takeover that was rocked by the resignation of its CEO and the death of previous backer Mike Lynch.

The private equity giant confirmed on Tuesday that it had agreed to buy Darktrace, delisting the company from the London Stock Exchange in a take-private deal.

The closure ends a tense few months for Darktrace as the company struggled to finalize the cross-cutting deal agreed in April. The takeover gained greater public awareness after Lynch’s death in August.

Lynch was killed along with six other passengers when Bayesian the yacht he was sailing on sank after being caught in a storm in the Mediterranean Sea. His death left unresolved a civil lawsuit with HPE over its $11.7 billion acquisition of Autonomy in 2011 and helped resurface questions about Darktrace.

In early September, Darktrace co-founder and CEO Poppy Gustafsson unexpectedly resigned from the company just weeks before the acquisition was completed.

Gustafsson co-founded Darktrace in 2013 after leaving Lynch’s controversial Autonomy Group, where she was corporate controller. In her statement announcing her resignation, Gustafsson stated that she looked forward to continuing to work at Darktrace as a non-executive director following the completion of the transaction.

“Darktrace has been a huge part of my life and my identity for over a decade, and I am extremely proud of everything we have achieved in that time,” Gustafsson said in a statement.

In its statement, Darktrace said all of the company’s non-executive directors had resigned and left the board.

A Darktrace representative did not immediately respond Fortune asking for clarification as to whether this applies to Gustafsson.

Gustafsson was replaced by chief operating officer Jill Popelka, who only joined the cybersecurity group in January as a non-executive director. Popelka previously worked at Snap, Accenture and SAP SuccessFactors.

“Protecting businesses and organizations with best-in-class, proactive, AI-powered cybersecurity will remain at the absolute core of what we do,” Popelka said in a statement. Together we can go even further by investing in our people to improve our technical capabilities and deliver exceptional service and value to our customers.”

Thoma Bravo’s takeover was considered a major blow to the London Stock Exchange, which has seen several large companies delist from the stock exchange in recent months, opting for rival exchanges or going private.

“Darktrace is uniquely positioned at the forefront of cybersecurity technology,” said Seth Boro, managing partner at Thoma Bravo.

“As one of the early adopters of artificial intelligence, the value of its capabilities is clear to businesses, governments and society around the world. We are excited to work with Jill and the Darktrace team to build on their success and support their ambition to protect the world from the most advanced cyber threats.”

Mike Lynch Links

Lynch was a major early backer of Darktrace through his venture capital firm Invoke Capital. He helped set up a private equity fund with £500 million from the HPE acquisition. Lynch installed several key Autonomy players at the helm of Darktrace, including his former protégé Gustafsson.

At the time of his death, Lynch owned about 3% of the company.

Stephen Chamberlain, his co-defendant in June’s US criminal trial and former chief operating officer of Darktrace, died after being hit by a car while fleeing in Cambridgeshire. He died the same day as Bayesian sank.

Darktrace became a short-selling target last year after U.S. hedge fund Quintessential Capital Management questioned the company’s financial reports.

An independent investigation by EY found no need for Darktrace to amend its previous financial statements, and the matter apparently did not discourage Thoma Bravo from pursuing the now-completed acquisition.

This story was originally published on Fortune.com