Mindspeed acquiring Ample's carrier Ethernet products, IP

SEPTEMBER 5, 2007 — Mindspeed Technologies, Inc., of Newport Beach, CA, entered into an agreement to acquire the product portfolio and intellectual property (IP) assets of Ample Communications, Inc., an Ethernet media access controller (MAC) product developer. Mindspeed will incorporate the assets into carrier Ethernet aggregation applications.

Mindspeed will pay approximately $4.6 million in cash to acquire the assets in a private foreclosure sale from Ample's senior creditor. Ample provides major OEM equipment customers components for installation in Ethernet metropolitan, access, and enterprise networks, including wireless/cellular backhaul and Ethernet-over-SONET applications. Mindspeed will market, sell, and support these Ethernet aggregation products with 2–24 port densities and Ethernet transmission speeds from 10 Mbits/sec. to 10 Gbits/sec. It will also develop and further extend the Ethernet MAC product line.

The acquisition represents an additional strategic market segment for Mindspeed, explains Raouf Halim, CEO, Mindspeed. Ample's products and IP will diversify Mindspeed's WAN portfolio, he adds. Mindspeed will back the extended product family with network-infrastructure experience, customer support, and global sales support.

The transaction should close before the end of the current fiscal quarter, subject to the satisfaction of various conditions. Revenues from the acquired products could contribute about $3 million to Mindspeed in FY2008, with margins generally in line with the corporate average. The company does not expect any impact to its non-GAAP operating profitability in the first half of FY2008 and expects the acquisition to be accretive in the second half of FY2008.

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