ADP Eyes Cashing in on Latin American Market With Acquisition

With the Latin American labor market continuing to grow, Automatic Data Processing Inc. has acquired PayRoll S.A., a Latin American provider of payroll, human resources and benefits services, ADP announced June 7.

PayRoll, headquartered in Santiago, Chile, provides business software for more than 1,300 clients and employs more than 450 people across Argentina, Chile and Peru, according to the announcement. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

While Roseland, New Jersey-based ADP already serviced clients in Brazil through the company’s GlobalView and Streamline initiatives, both ADP and PayRoll said the formal partnership will strengthen and solidify their presence in Latin America.

“I am convinced that by formally combining forces, PayRoll S.A. will benefit from the scale, resources and product innovation of this leading provider of global HCM solutions,” said Rodrigo Castro Melfi, PayRoll’s founder, in a written statement.

The acquisition comes at a time when Latin America is experiencing a development boom. The region was ranked the second-highest on the Human Development Index—a metric measuring income, health and education economic indicators—among developing regions and is surpassed only by Central Asia and Europe, according to the United Nations’ Human Development Report 2013.

“Latin America is an exciting high-growth market for HR solutions,” said Gary Bragar, HR outsourcing research director at advisory firm NelsonHall, in a written statement. “We see strong momentum in the region with annual growth rates in the high single digits.”

Jessica DuBois-Maahs is Workforce’s editorial intern. Comment below or email editors@workforce.com. Follow DuBois-Maahs on Twitter at @JessDuBoisMaahs.