Enablence Technologies to acquire Wave7 Optics for $10.5 million

April 15, 2008, Ottawa, Ont., Canada--Enablence Technologies, a supplier of planar lightwave circuit (PLC) based components for the fiber-to-the-home (FTTH), metro, and long-haul telecom markets, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire all outstanding shares of Wave7 Optics (Alpharetta, GA).

This is Enablence's third acquisition in the last 15 months. Earlier this year the company purchased ANDevices; in March 2007 the company bought Albis Optoelectronics.

Under the terms of the agreement, Enablence will acquire, through a wholly-owned US subsidiary, all the shares of Wave7 Optics for an aggregate purchase price of US $10.5 million and 2,078,385 common shares of Enablence. All conditions pursuant to the agreement are expected to be fulfilled prior to May 15, 2008.

Wave7 Optics is a global provider of FTTH systems that deliver voice, video, and data services. Wave7 Optics is deploying a universal access platform that supports Gigabit Ethernet Passive Optical Network (GE-PON) systems and Gigabit Passive Optical Network (GPON) systems, as well as point-to-point Ethernet. The platform is marketed under the name of Trident7 and serves the needs of a broad range of service providers.

"This is an exciting acquisition for Enablence as Wave7 Optics is a recognized global leader in the FTTH systems market with a customer base of over a hundred FTTH service providers," said Arvind Chhatbar, CEO of Enablence.

"In the FTTH market, vendors must meet the performance and volume requirements as well as the price targets that service providers are demanding," said Tom Tighe, president and CEO of Wave7 Optics. "The combination of our Trident7 system and Enablence's PLC technology will benefit our current customer base and position us for the global growth in FTTH deployments. We look forward to expanding our market reach as an Enablence company."

"The optical block represents the most significant cost contributor to the ONT and the Enablence PLC technology solution offers a substantial opportunity for cost reduction," said Jim Farmer, CTO of Wave7 Optics. "Integrating Enablence's PLC technology directly into the Trident7 system provides us with further competitive advantage."

Enablence will continue to develop, manufacture, and distribute PLC based transceivers to other system vendors in the marketplace, Chhatbar added.