Arasor expands portfolio with Alfalight and AOFR acquisitions

August 1, 2007, Mountain View, CA--Arasor has signed definitive agreements to purchase Alfalight (Madison, WI) and AOFR (Canberra, Australia) for US$63 million total. According to Arasor, these acquisitions give Arasor the three key elements common to all its products: optical chip, laser chip and optical coupler. Both companies bring with them blue chip customers, including Telstra, Avanex, Siemens, and a variety of tier 1 telecom companies, according to Arasor chief executive Simon Cao.

"With these acquisitions, Arasor has brought the critical laser element in-house, enabling improved profitability and control of future laser developments in Arasor's emerging markets," Cao said. "We now control the three key elements common to all our products (optical chip, laser chip and coupler), and bring significant revenue opportunities to bear in addition to their existing $20 million per annum revenue streams. We are very excited about the prospect of expanding our product offering to include laser components for the telecom market ."

Originally founded in 1998, Alfalight is a designer and manufacturer of high-power diode lasers for the telecommunications market. Alfalight has received over $57 million of venture funding, and substantial US government funding of R&D. Their assets include a state-of -the-art InGaAs FAB in which they grow their laser chips.

Mohan Warrior, CEO of Alfalight will continue to run the laser company as a wholly owned subsidiary of Arasor. He brings 23 years of semiconductor and photonics experience to the Arasor team. Prior to leading Alfalight's growth and profitability over the last four years, he held senior leadership positions at Motorola Semiconductors (now Freescale) including managing globally distributed operations of 4000 employees shipping $4B product annually.

"I am excited by the growth prospects that Arasor brings, particularly in the emerging Asian markets of China and India," Warrior said. "Arasor's unique optical chip technology will dramat ically enhance our proprietary laser capabilities to create a diverse range of differentiated telecom & consumer optical products."

Cao also noted that the management team of Alfalight includes seasoned industry veterans from Motorola and Intel who bring semiconductor manufacturing management experience to the Arasor team."

AOFR was established in Canberra, Australia in 1984 manufacturing optical couplers for fiber lasers and WDM in 1988. AOFR designs its technology and platforms in Canberra and mass manufactures packages via a fully automated facility in Asia. AOFR's technology gives Arasor control over the critical light delivery element common to all its products, coupling the light between their transmitters in wirelines and wireless, and from the laser TV source to the display.

"With this acquisition from Verrillon, we take control of the second critical element of light delivery technology common to all our products, and broaden our customer base to include most of the tier 1 telecom players in the United States," Cao said. "We expect to leverage our China and India relationships to broaden AOFR's customer base into those hyper growth markets. AOFR also created a critical element of fiber lasers which will become a critical piece of the access network where we operate our unique optically driven wireless systems."