Germany's Software AG said it will buy IT consultancy group IDS Scheer for almost 500 million euros ($696 million) in what will be the first major corporate takeover in Germany this year.

The combination of the two successful business models is expected to be accretive to Software AG's operating earnings per share already in the first full fiscal year of consolidation (2010), Software AG said in a statement.

Depending when IDS Scheer is included, Software AG said its growth target can be beaten but added that a concrete forecast would only be possible after the deal is done -- which will be with results in the third quarter at the earliest.

Software AG, Germany's No.2 software maker after SAP (SAPG.DE) and No.4 in Europe, said it had already bought the 48 percent stake owned by IDS's founders August-Wilhelm Scheer and Alexander Pocsay.

It will now offer 15 euros for each of the remaining shares, bringing the total purchase price to about 487 million euros.

The formal offer period will start in August and finish before the end of September, Software AG said.

The transaction will create a global vendor of infrastructure software and Business Process Management with more than 6,000 employees and more than 1 billion euros in sales, the company said.

August-Wilhelm Scheer has in the past ruled out a sale of the company he founded in 1984, but told a German magazine late last year a disposal was a possibility if it could not boost profitability.

This is my life's work, Scheer said at the time. He had repeatedly dismissed rumors German software giant SAP (SAPG.DE) was in talks to buy IDS Scheer.

(Reporting by Christiaan Hetzner and Nicola Leske)

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