Software company Kallidus has announced its acquisition of people operations platform Sapling.

The acquisition looks to transform the Cirencester-based business, which is backed by Apse Capital, into a full-suite human capital management (HCM) software and digital learning provider, offering businesses solutions across the entire employee lifecycle.

Based in San Francisco in the United States and Vancouver in Canada, Sapling is a people operations platform that automates people workflows by connecting people data across existing HR systems to save everyone time and help people build better companies.

Sapling, which was founded in 2017 and employs 50 people, is growing rapidly and works with more than 200 international clients, including the likes of InVision, Digital Ocean, Coupa, Geckoboard and IOSH.

It is the second acquisition made by Kallidus since Apse Capital partnered with the company in March 2019. Kallidus bolstered its digital learning offering in March 2020 with the acquisition of Engage in Learning, a provider of high-quality, easy to use, engaging and editable eLearning.

Following the latest acquisition, Kallidus' team is now 200-strong, across offices in the UK, US and Canada.

Rob Caul, CEO of Kallidus, said: "Sapling is an impressive business that represents an excellent strategic fit for Kallidus and we are delighted to welcome them to our team. Together, we can help meet the significant unmet demand for full HCM and eLearning solutions and provide international businesses with a one-stop solution for all their HR and Digital Learning needs across the entire employee lifecycle."

Andy Crebar, CEO of Sapling, added: "We're excited about the teaming up with Kallidus to accelerate our mission and vision of helping people operations and HR teams globally. By integrating with Kallidus' existing high-quality offering and its award-winning software platform and digital learning content, we can take our growth to the next level.

"With the impact of COVID-19 accelerating demand for integrated HR software and creating new challenges for businesses around the world, we see numerous opportunities to help even more people build better companies."