Motorola commences tender offer for Vertex

[escomm]

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/071105/aqm126.html?.v=24



(thieved from hamsexy)

[xmo]

Love child of the marriage:

[Rayjk110]

That thing almost looks like a Kenwood more than anything else


Got more info on that beast?

[Terry_Glover]

Basic models start at $10,000.00

[aaknitt]

Wow. Anyone placing bets on whether this means we'll see a Moto branded ham HT?

[The Pager Geek]

I read this as:

"We at Motorola are frustrated giving support and warranty replacements for entry level products we push out before thorough testing. So, let us merge with a company to deal with all the little people that can't spend at least $3k per portable."

tpg

[MTS2000des]

I also think this will be the end of Yaesu amateur radio products. Motorola hates ham radio- and would love to shut down the least profitable division of their latest acquisition. So enjoy your Yaesu gear while you can...

[WV8VFD]

Here is the ARRL Bulliton.

SB SPCL @ ARL $ARLX007ARLX007 Motorola buys Yaesu ZCZC AX07QST de W1AW Special Bulletin 7 ARLX007From ARRL Headquarters Newington CT November 5, 2007To all radio amateurs SB SPCL ARL ARLX007ARLX007 Motorola buys Yaesu Motorola USA has announced its intention to launch a tender offer toacquire a controlling interest in Vertex Standard Co, Ltd. VertexStandard is the parent company of Yaesu. Motorola will own 80percent of Vertex Standard; Tokogiken, a privately held Japanesecompany, controlled by current president and CEO of Vertex StandardJun Hasegawa, will retain 20 percent, forming a joint venture. Thetotal purchase price for 80 percent of the outstanding shares on afully diluted basis will be approximately US $108 million.NNNN/EX

[Grog]

I also think this will be the end of Yaesu amateur radio products. Motorola hates ham radio- and would love to shut down the least profitable division of their latest acquisition. So enjoy your Yaesu gear while you can...

If so, there's the end of the most rugged ham gear out there. A sad day if they actually close the door on the hams.......

[billy7834]

An even bigger implication....Vertex has been the main competition for Moto in public safety. NYPD has pretty much abandoned M in favor of Vertex in the past couple of years. So, is Moto saying if we can't get the contract...we'll buy the company that did? Wow.

[Vercomm]

I haven't been very impressed with the Vertex gear I've seen and worked with, I think this is great for commercial guys. Maybe the Vertex radios will start lasting past their 3 year warranty. Sounds like bad news for HAMS if they cut out that product line.

[jackhackett]

I haven't been very impressed with the Vertex gear I've seen and worked with, I think this is great for commercial guys. Maybe the Vertex radios will start lasting past their 3 year warranty. Sounds like bad news for HAMS if they cut out that product line.

That's okay, I have't been very impressed with the Motorola gear I've seen and worked with.


Nothing good ever comes of a deal like this, more likely than not Moto will just liquidate Vertex, then go to work on aquiring Kenwood.

[MSS-Dave]

An even bigger implication....Vertex has been the main competition for Moto in public safety. NYPD has pretty much abandoned M in favor of Vertex in the past couple of years. So, is Moto saying if we can't get the contract...we'll buy the company that did? Wow.

If /\/\ wanted to do that, they would go after M-A/Com. /\/\ has lost CRAPLOADS of existing/new business to them. Don't think YaeComWood total comes anywhere near the M-A/Com deals I've been seeing lately..

Dave

[xmo]

Toyco gets just enough business to keep Motorola sort of competetive and keep the Justice Dept off their case.

When it was run by Ericcson, they made a decision to oppose TDMA P25 and have consequently missed most of the Homeland Defence funded public safety system sales and upgrades.

This Vertex acquisiton does help keep the scale of the radio business in perspective. If 80% of Vertex = $108 M, then the whole company worth is about $135 M. That's about one big statewide system sale for Motorola.

[firefighter13669]

Motorla has seen the light is all this means.Motorola Two way radios sales div is down.The quality of there radios in the last 5 years are poor.I sure moto knows this and knows that vertex is doing well.The Dont think moto will do away with the ham radios.The reason they dont like them is because their are to many options and you dont need to purchase 350.00 software to use it...

[libuff]

putting those numbers into perspective does really make you say huh? a productive & competitive company such as Vertex is worth $125m? wow. thats really quite low.

heck an web 2.0 company such as "facebook" has been valued WELL into the billions. and it has no true revenue stream, just the prospective stream of revenue through adds.

[MTS2000des]

Vertex Standard has a relatively small market share compared to Kenwood and Icom. I hardly see them in use in metro Atlanta compared to Kenwood (who has their comm HQ here) and Icom (pushed hard by BearComm). Even the big MSS, Diversified Electronics, sells and services Kenwoods now. Why? CUSTOMER DEMAND. Customers are coming in wanting Kenwood because they are half the cost of Motorola's low and mid tier radios and just as good if not better performers than any Waris radio or Pro series trash. I can see why Ma M would acquire V-S, this way they can concentrate on selling those big systems and when your cab drivers come in, sell them Vertex's. The money would go into the same pockets instead of a competitors.

[escomm]

Motorla has seen the light is all this means.Motorola Two way radios sales div is down.The quality of there radios in the last 5 years are poor.I sure moto knows this and knows that vertex is doing well.The Dont think moto will do away with the ham radios.The reason they dont like them is because their are to many options and you dont need to purchase 350.00 software to use it...

I don't know what you're talking about. The two-way division is Motorola's cashcow and the spine of the company. It makes money hand over fist.

[firefighter13669]

I understand the money motorola makes on their two way radios but when they are $1000 for a portable radios that doenst perform its a problem.Vertex by no means is ever going to be as big as moto however I think from motos point they know buy having vertex they can improve their products and add features that vertex already has.....

[mr.syntrx]

Toyco gets just enough business to keep Motorola sort of competetive and keep the Justice Dept off their case.

Most of M/A-COM's money comes from their SIGINT, EW and other defence products. Their radio business is really just a sideline show in comparison.

[EngineerZ]

I also think this will be the end of Yaesu amateur radio products. Motorola hates ham radio- and would love to shut down the least profitable division of their latest acquisition. So enjoy your Yaesu gear while you can...

If mother-/\/\ doesn't discontinue the Yaesu ham line, I wonder if you'll have to sign a four-page software license agreement to order a Yaesu HF rig? Will you have to open a case and fax an address change on letterhead in order to get them to send extra Yaesu manuals and accessories to your summer cottage?

--z

[firetech792]

I can tell you our large state gov't agency has just recently started buying new Kenwood mobiles instead of the big M. Reason....they now get two Kenwoods for the price of one M.

[Bat2way]

No effect here. Never had a desire to mess with Vertex and Motorola has just lost focus over the years.

[escomm]

As of now, Motorola plans on keeping the brand separate. It doesn't sound like they have any plans for gutting the ham gear. The word today was the Motorola sounded impressed by Yaesu's product line.

[Will]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wavelengths
Consolidation goes in the wrong direction
By Glenn Bischoff
Mobile Radio Technology Magazne
November 9, 2007

We've written often in the past about the merits of industry consolidation, expressing the belief that it would be good for the urgent-communications sector if the vendor population coalesced into three strong players that could compete on more equal footing with Motorola, which still is the 900-pound gorilla. That's not a knock against Motorola. It's just that we believe customers benefit from technology and price innovation when relatively equal combatants slug it out.

Unfortunately, Motorola keeps screwing up that strategy by making its own acquisitions to strengthen its position in the jungle. First there was the purchase of MeshNetworks, in November 2004, which boosted the company's wireless mesh network portfolio. Roughly two years later, Motorola spent $3.9 billion for Symbol Technologies, a leader in radio frequency identification and wireless LAN technologies. Given the long-embraced adage that it usually is faster and less expensive to acquire expertise than to develop it on your own, these deals made perfect business sense.

This week, Motorola made a purchase that doesn't fit this model, agreeing to acquire 80% of Japan-based Vertex Standard for $108 million (see story below) during the next two months. After all, Motorola already knows how to make radios, and quite well at that. So, we've been wondering what the giant is thinking.

One rationale is that Motorola is buying Vertex in order to gain entry into the lower-price sector. Price-point diversification always is a good strategy. General Motors has been doing it for years, with its Cadillac brand targeted to the most affluent buyers, Buick and Oldsmobile (now defunct) targeted to the middle tier, and Chevrolet targeted to the lower tier. Motorola is best known for its technologically advanced but comparatively expensive radios, so why not look for a way to sell radios to customers that can't afford top-of-the-line gear? There's always going to be demand for low-price radios.

I bounced this theory off Steve Guller, vice president of Warner Communications, a two-way radio dealership in St. Louis. Guller told me that the theory would be solid, except for one thing: Motorola already has dipped its toe into the lower-price market. Then he proceeded to explain why he thought Motorola might have acquired Vertex: it makes a radio at the lower price points that is better than what Motorola has been able to offer.

"Vertex, engineering-wise can get a product done a lot cheaper than Motorola," Guller said. "Where Motorola will put a whole team of engineers on a project, Vertex -- and this is the Japanese way -- will put six guys on it. They're much more efficient." He speculated that the acquisition would let Motorola focus its engineering on the higher-spec products because Vertex would be handling the low-end and mid-tier products, which it already is doing well.

When I mentioned to Guller that Motorola was being uncharacteristically tight-lipped about this purchase, he wasn't surprised. "My opinion is that this is not the end game, it's a step towards the end game," he said. "There's something else going on that we don't know about."

Perhaps. But the secrecy also could be due simply to the fact that the deal is not completed or that Vertex is a Japanese company. I remember when Kenwood, also a Japanese company, announced earlier this year that it had agreed to acquire Zetron. I called a source at Zetron to find out more about the deal and came away empty -- which doesn't happen to me very often. It would have been easier to extract a wisdom tooth from a grizzly bear. I think this source was scared to say anything. Japanese companies typically keep things close to the vest and expect their business partners to do the same.

Regardless of the reasons for this acquisition and whether it portends a bigger play down the road, Motorola's purchase of Vertex should be sending a shiver up the spine of radio-manufacturer executives. The giant is getting bigger. Consolidation is happening -- just not in the way it needs to.

Glenn Bischoff

[Railroad Spectra]

Good thing I have no Vertex/Yaesu gear. Motorola would like to see ham radio DISAPPEAR. They stand to make BILLIONS if they could convince the FCC to refarm 2 meters alone. BAD NEWS.

[kato56]

I can see it now, an Vertex Astro P-25 Ham HT to compete with Icom's D-Star line.

[Dan562]

Hmmm, Motorola's Corporate Executives screwed up the parent company, employees, products and customers, and now they're out to do the same to their competition. I suppose they'll call the new venture: Yaesumoto .... it sure has that Oriental sound to the name.

[mr.syntrx]

I can see it now, an Vertex Astro P-25 Ham HT to compete with Icom's D-Star line.

Won't happen, for two reason: The amateur manufacturers don't see P25 on the ham bands as anything but a small curiosity shared by a minority, and they don't want cheap P25 gear competing with their expensive equipment.

[MTS2000des]

I can see it now, an Vertex Astro P-25 Ham HT to compete with Icom's D-Star line.

Won't happen, for two reason: The amateur manufacturers don't see P25 on the ham bands as anything but a small curiosity shared by a minority, and they don't want cheap P25 gear competing with their expensive equipment.

yep, thanks to all the turds on Ebay who are selling those FT-60's and VX-150's as "field programmable police/fire/ems" radios, you can rest assured P25 ham gear from any of the major manufacturers let alone ma M is a pipe dream. they aren't about to shoot themselves in the foot. aside, P25 phase 1 doesn't offer anything spectacular to the average ham where he would go out and drop 700-1000 bucks for an HT. The old farts around here are still pissing and moaning about using PL on repeaters being required by the local coordination body, and their still clinging to the CW keys fighting the CW wars- P25 yeah...maybe in 25 years...

[wkr518]

Love child of the marriage:

Been waiting for this thing to come out!
Dual control head would be nice also.
Wayne