Acquisition Strengthens NI Offering in Video and Audio Automated Test Applications

National Instruments today announced that it has acquired all of the outstanding shares of microLEX Systems A/S, a premier provider of virtual instrumentation-based video, audio and mixed-signal test solutions. National Instruments expects this acquisition to expand its growth in the professional and consumer video and audio test market by leveraging the NI global sales and support organization and microLEX’s domain expertise in video and audio test. Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

“The success of microLEX products is a testament to NI LabVIEW, PXI and modular instruments as a lower-cost, higher-performance platform for our customers in automated test, and the company brings tremendous experience in the growing video and audio test market,” said Pete Zogas, NI senior vice president of sales and marketing. “By combining microLEX’s strong domain expertise with the NI worldwide sales and support organization, we will be able to serve a wider customer base with a more targeted set of automated test products for the validation, manufacturing and service of the latest professional and consumer multimedia devices.”

Birger Schneider, microLEX managing director and founder, said, “As a Select National Instruments Alliance Partner, we have had a long-standing and prosperous relationship with NI. Our 16 years of experience designing low-cost video and audio test solutions based on LabVIEW along with PCI and PXI modular instrumentation will help NI become the premier worldwide supplier in this fast growing segment of test.”

microLEX customers include top companies in the telecommunications, consumer electronics, medical and automotive industries spanning across Asia, Europe and the Americas. Schneider will remain the managing director, and microLEX customers should continue to contact microLEX for all of their product and support needs. For details, readers can visit www.microlex.dk.

“NI continues to look for opportunities for leveraged acquisitions,” said Alex Davern, NI CFO. “Because the company is small relative to NI, we expect the acquisition to be neutral to non-GAAP earnings in 2008 and to be modestly accretive to non-GAAP earnings in 2009.”

About microLEX Systems A/S
Founded in 1992 and based in Hørsholm, Denmark, microLEX Systems A/S (www.microlex.dk) is a test tool and test solution provider in mixed-signal electronics, system test and board test. microLEX offers premier products for video and audio test, including VideoMASTER and HearMASTER, based on NI LabVIEW graphical development software and modular instrumentation hardware. For the past four years, the company has generated revenues with a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 40 percent. With 19 employees, microLEX serves customers in 17 countries in sectors including telecom, industrial control, space business, consumer electronics, biomedical and automotive.

About National Instruments
National Instruments (www.ni.com) is transforming the way engineers and scientists design, prototype and deploy systems for measurement, automation and embedded applications. NI empowers customers with off-the-shelf software such as NI LabVIEW and modular cost-effective hardware, and sells to a broad base of more than 25,000 different companies worldwide, with no one customer representing more than 3 percent of revenue and no one industry representing more than 10 percent of revenue. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, NI has more than 4,500 employees and direct operations in nearly 40 countries. For the past nine years, FORTUNE magazine has named NI one of the 100 best companies to work for in America.

Courtesy of  National Instruments