Bookham adds Ignis Optics to its collection
The deal comes just days after Bookham announced the acquisition of New Focus.
Under the terms of the agreement, Bookham will acquire Ignis Optics for $15.5 of new Bookham shares to be issued on completion of the acquisition in early October. Additionally, Bookham shares up to a value of $1.5 million will be issued in early 2005, should Ignis meet certain performance criteria during the 2004 fiscal year.
Ignis designs and manufactures small form-factor pluggable (SFP and XFP) single-mode optical transceivers for current and next-generation optical datacom and telecom networks. Ignis transceiver design skills provide an excellent match to Bookham s position in optics and electronics design.
The combined team will accelerate Bookham s move to provide a full XFP and SFP product set at multiple speeds and different reaches in order to address the majority of new datacom optics opportunities. This represents a new large market for Bookham with significant growth opportunities.
"Bookham is currently the number two telecom optical components supplier worldwide, but to date we have not played significantly in the datacom market, which is a large market opportunity for our optical know-how and manufacturing capabilities,” said Giorgio Anania, Bookham s president and CEO. “The technical team at Ignis is widely regarded as having a clear leadership in the field of next-generation pluggable optics. We see the combination of our skill sets as further enhancing Bookham s market opportunities."
"Bookham s technical strength and strong channels to market are the perfect match to ensure rapid revenue growth for Ignis portfolio of pluggable optical transceiver modules,” said Michael Lebby, co-founder of Ignis. “Bookham s broad customer base will enhance and diversify the market exposure of our optical transceivers."
Marconi sells its stake in Bookham
On September 24, the day before the Bookham-Ignis Optics announcement, telecoms equipment maker Marconi announced that it had sold its 6.3 percent stake in Bookham.
Marconi sold its holding of 12,891,000 shares, which it acquired when it sold its optical components business to Bookham in February 2002, for 16.76 million pounds ($28 million).
In July 2003, Nortel sold 30 million shares in Bookham, representing about half its stake in the company.
