HID Global in Irvine has acquired a Needham, Mass.-based company that specializes in secure access credentials and management for government agencies, office buildings, hospitals, schools and other highly visited areas.
HID, a unit of Stockholm, Sweden-based security services provider Assa Abloy Group AB, acquired EasyLobby Inc. for an undisclosed sum. The company picks up key software and other technologies used in visitor registration, tracking, reporting, badge printing, and time and attendance management.
“We’re broadening the scope of what HID Global has to offer,” said Tony Ball, senior vice president of identity- and access-management business. “EasyLobby has developed software that enables the capture of personalized data in a secure way.”
EasyLobby has installed more than 5,500 of its systems around the world.
HID makes smart cards and readers for governments, logistics companies and others, as well as animal tags and secure printers that personalize access credentials and encodes them with data. It recently ran a pilot at Arizona State University that allowed students and staff to access residence halls and rooms with smart phones equipped with near-field communication, which involves communication over short distances.
A user can touch a smart phone to a near-field communication tag and immediately get connected to a website, dial a number, launch an application or gain access to areas. The technology has been touted for mobile payments, and some major financial companies and retailers are starting to implement it.
Smart-card shipments could reach 7 billion this year, up more than 16% from 2011 as demand builds in emerging countries, according to Brussels, Belgium-based trade group Eurosmart.
HID also makes U.S. greencards for Mexican citizens through its Mountain View-based LaserCard Corp., which it bought in 2010
EasyLobby, located in the Boston area, will maintain its operation there, Ball said. The company was established in 1997 and has than less than 10 employees.
HID employs a few hundred people in Irvine, where it houses a distribution operation and some programming. It employs 2,100 people companywide.
HID executives wouldn’t disclose revenue figures. Its parent Assa Abloy sees about $6 billion in annual revenue and employs some 34,000 people.
HID was born out of the Hughes aircraft division in 1991. Its acronym stems from Hughes identification devices. The company was bought by Assa Abloy in 2000.
Power Generation
A unit of Irvine-based clean technology startup FlexEnergy Inc. has secured a bid to install and operate a power-generation system at the Santiago Canyon Landfill in Orange.
Earlier this month the Orange County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the measure, which will create one of the most energy-efficient systems in the world that destroys methane gas and other air pollutants, according to the company.
Its flagship product is the Flex Powerstation—a turbine and other equipment that breaks down methane gases and converts them to electricity with nearly no emissions.
An assessment of available landfill gas at the site suggests between 1.5 and 2 megawatts of power will be produced—enough to power 1,500 to 2,000 homes.
The Santiago Canyon project is expected to help Orange County meet air-quality emissions for waste gases scheduled to go into effect in 2013. The landfill has been closed since 1988, and has naturally burned off methane as trash decomposes.
FlexEnergy is now finalizing the utility connections and power purchase agreements, conducting an environmental review and preparing the site for development. The project is scheduled to be completed this year.
In August FlexEnergy moved into a two-story, 35,000-square-foot building near the former El Toro Marine base, quadrupling its headquarters space.
Tablets Take Off
2011 was heralded as the year of the tablet, and sales figures bear that out as the growth rate is expected to top 250% from a year earlier.
Tablet shipments topped 72.7 million units in 2011, accounting for more than a quarter of all mobile PC sales, according to data from DisplaySearch, a unit of NPD Group Inc. of Port Washington, N.Y.
Vizio Inc. in Irvine introduced its first tablet in 2011. And Irvine-based Toshiba America Electronic Components Inc.—a unit of Tokyo-based Toshiba Corp.—drove marketing and sales for Toshiba’s 7-inch Thrive tablet, which launched in September.
The explosive growth took a bite out of notebook and mini-note PC sales.
Notebook PC shipments in 2011 are projected to reach 187.5 million units, up 12% from 2010, but down from the previous forecast of 188 million. Mini-note PC shipments are expected to hit 25.2 million units, up 20% from 2010.
