Anania & Associates Investment Company LLC (AAI) has announced the sale of mWave Industries, which has been acquired by Alaris Holdings Limited, a publicly-traded company based in South Africa.
A provider of innovative custom and commercial microwave antenna solutions, mWave designs and manufactures products for commercial and government applications spanning the scientific, defense, and academic communities.
“Over the last 14 years, mWave Industries has grown to become one of the leaders in the millimeter-wave antenna industry. Alaris will be an excellent parent company for mWave, and we are excited to see what Alaris’ acquisition and planned investments do to continue the company’s growth as Alaris establishes their US headquarters in Maine,” said Peter V. Anania Chairman of AAI.
In addition to the multi-million dollar cash portion of the transaction the former owners of mWave received approximately 5% of Alaris Holdings stock and the Chairman of AAI will serve on the ALH:JO Board. Also, AAI’s Fund Manager, Anania & Associates (A&A), will be providing human resources, back office financial services as well as other strategic growth services. A&A offers these services to all of AAI’s portfolio companies.
AAI invested in the startup of the Windham-based mWave Industries LLC in July 2004, with its three founding partners/employees, Peter Farnum, Christopher Mosher and Michael Cahill. The company was first incubated at another AAI portfolio company, MEGA industries in Gorham.
Now with 15 employees, the company has a well-known name with global reach. mWave designed the first truly commercial 80 Ghz antennas for use in the telecom market with a development award from Maine Technology Institute (MTI). Also, with the help of the Finance Authority of Maine (FAME), it recently acquired and moved back to Maine the Gabriel and Mark antenna lines which had been manufactured by General Dynamics in North Carolina. As a result, mWave offers one of the broadest lines of microwave antennas in the industry.
The staff, management and founders of mWave Industries are all staying with the business. Following the acquisition, mWave Industries will also be hiring new team members in areas such as production control, accounting, sales, and engineering.
The acquisition by Alaris is not expected to result in any changes for customers, except for increased investments that will provide more resources for supporting customers. Additionally, mWave Industries and its customers will now have access to an expanded product portfolio that includes Alaris’ broad capabilities in directional finding antennas. Even though Alaris is an international company, they received the unconditional approvals from the US government and will still be able to support Department of Defense-related applications for customers. Because of Alaris’ focus on the sector, mWave Industries even anticipates being able to offer more defense-related work in the future.
Below is an overview of Alaris Holdings brands and product overview:
- COJOT Antennas: Innovative direction finding antennas, counter RCIED antennas and omnidirectional VHF/UHF/SHF wideband antennas.
- Alaris Antennas: offering an extensive range of HF, VHF, UHF and SHF (L-, S- and C- band) omni- directional and directional communications antennas, designed for mobile, base station, man-portable applications and radio communications.
- Mark Grid Antennas: The Mark line of grid antennas operate in range of frequency bands from 335 to 2700 MHz with antennas ranging in size from 3-ft (0.9) to 15-ft (4.6) diameter. www.markgridantenna.com
- Gabriel Antenna: Since 1943, Gabriel has consistently been the leader in the development of innovative microwave antenna designs to the point to point communications industry.
- mWAVE Industries: Microwave Antenna solutions from 100 MHz to 110 GHz – specializing in parabolic antenna, millimeter wave solutions, along with custom conscan and wide band feeds.
