Canadian patent-licensing firm WiLan intends buy rival Mosaid for $490 million
18 Aug 2011
Technology patent-licensing company WiLan Inc yesterday said that it intends to make an unsolicited all-cash offer to buy fellow Canadian patent company Mosaid Technologies Inc, for about C$480 million ($490 million).
Ottawa-based Wi-Lan has more than 1,400 issued or pending patents covering a wide range of communication and consumer electronics products including 3G and 4G handsets, Wi-Fi-enabled laptops, Wi-Fi/DSL routers, xDSL infrastructure equipment, cellular base stations and digital television receivers, while its same city rival, Mosaid, has a much larger patent portfolio of 2,822 patents and applications covering semiconductor and telecommunications technologies.
Over 250 companies, including Cisco, Nokia, Panasonic, Samsung, RIM, Sharp, Sony and Toshiba, have licensed WiLan's patents, while nearly 50 companies including Toshiba, NEC, Sony, Samsung, IBM, Nokia, LG Electronics and Panasonic have licensed Mosaid's patents.
"Combining the patent portfolios will provide a more efficient and rapid path to establishing a larger and more valuable aggregate portfolio given the combined management team's expertise and increased business scale," and the combined company will have access to capital to enforce its patents through litigation if necessary, WiLan said in a statement.
Under the terms of the proposed offer, Wilan will pay C$38 in cash per Mosaid share, representing a premium of about a 25 per cent to Mosaid's 10-day volume weighted average stock price.
Wilan, which became Ottawa's most valuable public company early this year with a market capitalisation of $867-million, had $180-million in cash on hand at the end of its last fiscal year. The company said that it would issue $200-million in debentures to help fund the deal.
