EFI has announced two major company pruchases: Italian textile printer specialist Reggiani Macchine and Matan, a super-wide format printer manufacturer.
The EFI move follows a Fespa Infotrends survey in which respondents selected UV inkjet printers as their top expected technology purchase, followed closely by textile printers.
Guy Gecht, chief executive at EFI
From its Bergamo base, Reggiani produces a range of industrial inkjet printers for printing on fabric. Its machines will undergo a rebrand as EFI Reggiani. Guy Gecht, chief executive at EFI, says, “This acquisition gives EFI an immediate leadership position in one of the world’s largest industries undergoing the transformation from analogue printing to digital. The textile printing market is just beginning that transition, which will enable manufacturers to shift from long-run to on-demand manufacturing, responding to the increasing demands of short runs and customisations. The addition of Reggiani’s innovative team and its made in Italy textile printing technology, renowned worldwide, will drive continued growth in industrial textile, and also enable EFI’s customers to expand into soft signage-based display graphics using Reggiani’s water-based industrial inkjet printers.”
Of the Matan buyout, Gecht says, “This acquisition gives EFI an even broader range of products to help our customers capture important opportunities in superwide-format display graphics printing. Matan’s strong research and development capability will further accelerate EFI’s inkjet innovation, while filling a key spot in EFI’s portfolio for a lower-acquisition cost line of roll-to-roll production printers focused on signage, banners, billboards and fleet graphics.”
The Matan Baraq 8Q industrial wide format printer
Based in Rosh Ha’Ayin, Israel, Matan has developed digital printers and presses for a range of industrial applications for more than a decade. Its work force of about 70 employees has joined EFI, giving EFI a significant presence in Israel. Hanan Yosefi, chief executive at Matan becomes an EFI vice president and general manager of EFI Inkjet Israel. He says, “Our technology and, most importantly, our customers have a great future ahead with EFI in terms of ongoing support and innovation. The Matan team and I are excited to continue growing and innovating as part of one of the world’s leading providers of industrial inkjet printing products.”
Similarly, former Reggiani shareholder Ambrogio Caccia Dominioni will become managing director of EFI Reggiani. He says, “Reggiani’s customers recognise that inkjet is the most important technology of the future for the textile industry but I wanted our company to be part of EFI not just because we will be joining a world-leading industrial inkjet technology company, but also because EFI is a leader in print industry workflow solutions and has a much larger sales and marketing platform around the world.
A 60 year history has seen Reggiani establish relationships with many of the leading textile manufacturing companies around the world. It serves customers in more than 120 countries with a distribution network and agents in over 40 countries.
Reggiani’s Renoir printer
Dominioni adds, “Together, EFI Reggiani can further extend its position as a global leader in digital inkjet textile printing technology with leading-edge products that accelerate the analog-to-digital transformation – all of which is vital to our customers’ future profitability. I am strongly committed to remain fully involved in the company to ensure a smooth integration, a successful implementation of the combined business plan, a growing centre of excellence in Italy for EFI’s textile inkjet business, and the growth of the EFI-Reggiani business to maintain a leading position in the printing market.”
To acquire all of Reggiani’s outstanding shares, EFI will repay Reggiani debt of about US$22.6M ($33.61m); pay the former Reggiani shareholders up to about US$30.8m cash; issue the former Reggiani shareholders up to about US$30.8m of EFI stock; will pay up to US$56.2m over as long as the next 30 months based on the achievement of revenue and profitability targets by the EFI Reggiani business.
EFI bought Matan with all-cash transaction in which EFI paid the shareholders of Matan approximately US$29m ($43.12m) to acquire all of Matan’s outstanding shares. Under the purchase agreement, EFI also assumed approximately US$5m of Matan’s debt, and deposited US$14m into escrow to serve as security for EFI’s benefit for the indemnification obligations of the Matan shareholders.
