Adata Technology Co (威剛), the world’s No. 2 memory module supplier, yesterday said it planned to acquire up to 70 percent of local air tools manufacturer De Poan Pneumatic Corp (力肯) in a NT$1.15 billion (US$37.8 million) deal to further diversify into non-memory sectors such as electric three-wheel mobility devices.
Adata offered to buy up to 36 million De Poan shares at NT$32 each through a public tender offer from today to Oct. 21.
Adata said it aims to acquire at least 18 million shares, or a 34 percent stake.
Photo: Grace Hung, Taipei Times
The offer represents a 11.11 percent premium compared with De Poan’s closing price of NT$28.8 on Tuesday.
“As our company has been proactively expanding to non-memory areas including electric vehicles and motors in recent years, the deal with De Poan will help us expand overseas, leveraging its original electronics-manufacturing experience,” Adata spokeswoman Gloria Chen (陳靜慧) said at a news conference at the Taipei Exchange.
In Taiwan, Adata’s electric three-wheel vehicles are widely adopted by logistics firms, Chen said.
A bulk of Adata’s revenue comes from memory modules, while non-memory business remained a minor revenue contributor, company data showed.
“We are very positive about the memory business this year,” Chen said in response to a reporter’s question about whether the company’s expansion to non-memory areas was to mitigate the memorychip industry’s boom-and-bust cycle.
As the two companies are highly complementary to each other in terms of sales, production and technology, it only took about two months to wrap up the talks for a “friendly takeover,” Adata said.
De Poan, established in 1983, is focused on manufacturing pneumatic tools used in the furniture and construction segments for global vendors on an original equipment manufacturing (OEM) contract basis.
The deal with Adata would help De Poan expand into new areas and reach new customers, De Poan chairman Roger Wen (溫銘漢) said.
“The air tool OEM market is small, as most brand-name vendors operate their own factories. We are one of very few OEM firms that can still make profits,” Wen said. “We aim to tap into new markets to broaden our product categories beyond furniture and construction tools.”
Wen did not comment on whether De Poan and Adata would explore the robotic arms business.
De Poan operates several factories in New Taipei City’s Bali District (八里). North America was its major export destination last year, accounting for 50 percent to 60 percent of revenue, company data showed.
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