A key acquisition has helped make Irvine’s Newport Corp. the “Wal-Mart” of industrial lasers and related gear, an analyst says.
Newport is boosting profits, beating estimates and has watched its stock climb nearly 30% this year. The company counted a recent market value of $700 million last week.
Now Newport hopes to grab more business and go after new markets. It’s poised for what could be growth down the road as lasers find their way into more products.
The company can point to a big bet it made two years ago when it paid $400 million for Thermo Electron Corp.’s Spectra-Physics, which makes machines for producing lasers.
The move doubled Newport’s yearly revenue to about $440 million now. The deal made Newport the first major company to sell laser devices as well as equipment to control and manipulate them.
“A lot of people were skeptical,” said Charles Cargile, chief financial officer.
Newport saw change coming, Chief Executive Robert Deuster said. More companies wanted to buy laser gear from one place, he said.
“That was a defining move,” he said. “It’s kind of thrown the industry into a new mode.”
For more on this story, see the Oct. 9 edition of the Business Journal.
