EXFO Inc. (NASDAQ: EXFO) (TSX: EXF) says it has agreed to buy fellow test and measurement instrument developer Yenista Optics. The acquisition price was not disclosed. As Yenista is based in France, the deal faces several conditions that EXFO must meet before the acquisition can close. The company offered no timetable for when it expects these conditions will be met.
Privately held Yenista Optics is based in Lannion, France, and focuses on test instruments for optical communications systems design and manufacture. Michiel van der Keur and Alain Poudoulec founded the company in 2003, with an initial focus oncoupling and dispersive free-space optical systems based on diffraction gratings. The company began work in the test field 2006 and released a tunable filter in 2007. Yenista's efforts in test received a significant boost in 2009 when it acquired several assets from Anritsu (see "Anritsu transfers technology to Yenista Optics"), including what would become the company's flagship TUNICS and OSICS tunable laser platform lines. The company also offers optical spectrum analyzers. Its newest product is the CTP10, a platform for testing passive optical components such as photonic integrated circuits (PICs) and wavelength-selective switches (see "Yenista Optics CTP10 tests photonic integrated circuits, other optical components").
In addition to its French operations, Yenista has an office in California and a subsidiary in Shanghai. EXFO says its acquisition target generated €5.2 million in revenue last year and was profitable.
EXFO is on a bit of an acquisition spree, having announced a deal for mobile network analytics company Astellia last week (see "EXFO to buy stake in mobile performance analysis company Astellia, plans voluntary takeover bid"). Earlier this year the company purchased network topology discovery technology developer Ontology Systems (see "EXFO buys Ontology Systems for real-time network topology discovery and service-chain mapping"). EXFO also acquired essentially all of the assets of optical RF test vendor Absolute Analysis in late 2016 (see "EXFO buys Absolute Analysis for optical RF over CPRI test technology").
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Stephen Hardy | Editorial Director and Associate Publisher
Stephen Hardy has covered fiber optics for more than 15 years, and communications and technology for more than 30 years. He is responsible for establishing and executing Lightwave's editorial strategy across its digital magazine, website, newsletters, research and other information products. He has won multiple awards for his writing.
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