PARIS, May 2 (Reuters) - U.S. private equity firm Bain

Capital is looking at buying some key assets of French tech and

software company Atos, reported French paper Les Echos

on its website, citing sources.

Atos is in the middle of a restructuring and planned asset

sale programme. Last month, the French government made a

provisional offer to acquire various strategically important

assets from Atos, including its Advanced Computing,

Mission-Critical Systems and Cyber Products divisions.

Bain Capital declined to comment.

WHY IT IS IMPORTANT:

The French government considers Atos as having assets

that are of strategic importance to France.

Atos secures communications for the French military and

secret services and manufactures servers to make supercomputers

capable of processing vast amounts of data for research or to

develop the nascent artificial intelligence industry.

Atos also runs data for the Paris Olympic Games.

WHO ELSE IS INTERESTED IN ATOS?

Thales said this week it could be tempted by

Atos' defence assets.

Media reports have also said that planemaker Dassault

Aviation and Czech businessman Daniel Kretinsky would be

interested in Atos.

BY THE NUMBERS:

Atos shares are down around 70% so far in 2024. The

company has a market capitalisation of roughly 220 million

euros.

Atos, which has been in refinancing talks with its banks

for several weeks, said this week that it needed 1.1 billion

euros in cash to fund operations over 2024-2025.