Telecom infrastructure firm Intrado is buying Swiss wireless messaging company bmd wireless in a cash and stock deal worth about $18.5 million.
The new company will be known as bmd wireless, an Intrado company, and will be based in Intrado’s home state of Colorado.
The deal, which is expected to close in late February, could be valued higher if bmd meets certain revenue targets in 2004.
Christopher Tiensch, chief executive officer of bmd wireless, said the combined strengths of both companies would bolster its goal of delivering messaging services to international customers. The merger comes as Intrado is planning to expand its offerings into new markets.
“We’ve recognized for awhile the real power and the rapid growth in the data services market,” Dan Hoskins, senior vp of Intrado, told internetnews.com. “We targeted messaging and during that process bmg came to us looking into ways to partner.”
Bmd wireless solutions are targeted toward both consumer and enterprise subscribers. Their offering includes a Wireless Application Messaging Server, a service that captures incomplete calls when a user is out of coverage and SMS Spam Filtering.
According to Hoskins, the deal is very important to Intrado and its customers. “We’ve got a strong position in our core business, we’re financially stable and this basically enables us to expand the breadth of the value proposition that we can deliver to the wireless operators,” he said.
The deal moves Intrado beyond its traditional 911 business, which has recently scored a win with AT&T, which recently teamed with the carrier to develop 911 calling features for the VoIP service.
“We do think that there are a lot of similarities and synergies,” Hoskins told internetnews.com. “From a similarity side the types of core network infrastructure that we manage with 911, while they are different in terms of the domain area, they are comparable in terms of the capabilities required to manage them.”
He said no staff reductions were planned in North America as a result of the acquisition.
Intrado also announced its fourth quarter earnings yesterday, along with 2003 revenue of $124.7 million, up from $107.7 million in 2002.