It appears the $148 million price tag for Santa Ana-based SRS Labs Inc. was right on the money, according to industry analysts.
“We do not see this as overly expensive,” Barbara Coffey, an analyst at National Securities Corp. in New York, wrote in a note to investors.
Analysts at New York-based Brigantine Advisors shared the same sentiment.
SRS has had a bumpy road as a publicly traded company, hitting an all-time high of $24 a share in March 2000 during the dot.com craze. Shares prices sank to $2 by December of that year.
Its selling price earlier this month represented a 38% premium on SRS’ stock price of $6.86 at of the close of trading April 16, but still well off its record high.
Calabasas-based competitor DTS Inc. recently acquired SRS in a cash-and-stock deal. The buy brought DTS key audio patents and entree into the fast-growing mobile-device market.
SRS is a research and development company that found a niche creating software and components that boost sound quality in audio devices, including tablets, smart phones, TVs, computers and other devices.
SRS specializes in surround sound, audio rendering and voice processing. It develops and licenses its technology to consumer electronics makers, home theater builders, computer game developers, carmakers and others.
DTS specializes in compressing and decompressing audio.
“As increasingly consumers are using more devices for media consumption, the post-processing portion becomes more important,” Coffey said.
DTS provided a larger platform SRS needed to fully grow, SRS Chairman and Chief Executive Thomas C.K. Yuen said.
“SRS customers and partners will benefit from increased services around the world,” Yuen said.
Ingram Marketing VP
Ingram Micro Inc. Chief Executive Alain Monie has made his second significant hire to shore up the executive ranks.
Former company executive Jennifer Anaya returns to Ingram in a new role as vice president of marketing for North American operations. The appointment highlights the company’s efforts to boost its standing in the information technology channel.
The industry veteran has nearly two decades of marketing experience and has been recognized as the “Most Powerful Women in the Channel” by CRN Magazine.
Santa Ana-based Ingram is the biggest distributor of computers, software and other technology products in the world and the largest public company based in Orange County by revenue, with more than $36 billion in sales in 2011. It relies on thousands of resellers to sell goods and services.
Anaya is responsible for the distributor’s U.S. and Canadian marketing. She will oversee daily operations of the company’s fast-growing Marketing Services and Events Agency, as well as customer communities, multimillion-dollar marketing services engine, two Solution Centers and the Ingram Micro Experience Center, a 1,000-square-foot technology demonstration area in Buffalo, N.Y.
Anaya spent a decade with Ingram in a variety of roles that included overseeing the adoption of Ingram Micro’s Partner Smart brand and spearheading several strategic marketing and communications initiatives, including the successful launch of the company’s marketing agency in 2006. She most recently served as vice president of marketing for NetEnrich Inc., a San Jose-based provider of remote IT and cloud services.
In March Monie tapped Michael Romero as vice president and general manager of Ingram’s North American mobile business unit, a new division aimed at capturing business in the growing mobile segment. Monie rejoined Ingram in November as president after a year of heading a manufacturer in China before being promoted in late January. He replaced Gregory Spierkel, who said he left the company to spend more time with his aging parents in Quebec.
Fueling Station
Seal Beach-based Clean Energy Fuels Corp. has signed a deal with a Florida waste collection, recycling and disposal company to build and operate a natural gas fueling station at its headquarters and throughout the South.
The station, located in the southeastern coastal city of Fort Pierce, is slated to open in the third quarter. It will support Waste Pro USA’s new fleet of natural gas-powered trash trucks.
In October, Waste Pro announced a $100 million investment to transition its fleet of heavy trucks from diesel fuel to cleaner compressed natural gas.
Waste Pro will deploy 150 heavy-duty waste collection and recycling trucks to serve residential and commercial customers in the first phase of the initiative.
Clean Energy has annual revenue of more than $290 million and hopes to clear earnings hurdles by building a network of fueling stations for the largest segment of the market: heavy-duty haulers that consume some $30 billion of fuel annually. That dwarfs the public sector and waste management industries combined.
The company lost $47.6 million in 2011 amid a push to build and expand what Clean Energy is calling “America’s Natural Gas Highway.”
Major transportation arteries in California, Texas and the Midwest are expected to have natural gas stations spread out every 250 miles or so when the multiyear project concludes.
