October 21, 2019AutoGuide Mobile Robots is being acquired by Teradyne, Inc. (TER) for $165 million. The deal announced today is structured to include $58 million net of cash acquired plus $107 million if certain performance targets are met extending potentially through 2022. The deal adds yet another growing autonomous mobile robot business to Teradynes already high growth portfolio of robotics companies. The deal is expected to close by the end of Q4, 2019. Teradyne previously acquired Universal Robotics (UR), a collaborative robotics arm company. This was followed by the acquisition in 2018 of Mobile Industrial Robotics (MiR), one of the leading autonomous mobile robotics (AMR) vendors.
AutoGuide president and CEO, Rob Sullivan (image courtesy of AutoGuide Mobile Robots)
AutoGuide makes heavy duty mobile robots
AutoGuide Mobile Robots portfolio of products is a good balance to the MiR product line. MiR AMRs can carry payloads from 100 kg, up to 1000 kg. The AutoGuide N10 Pallet Stacker is designed to autonomously acquire and move pallet unit loads up to 1200 kg. The AutoGuide N10 Tugger is an AMR capable of pulling large carts of materials for a variety of manufacturing and warehouse / logistics use cases.
- The Max N10 Pallet Stacker can lift loads onto racks up to 5 ft high.
- The Max N10 Pallet Stacker comes in two payload models: 800 kg and 1,200 kg
- The Max N10 Tugger can pull loads up to 45K kg.
On the software side, the AutoGuide Surepath software will ease the deployment and operation of fleets of AMRs. AutoGuide’s solution is unique in the stacking and tugging market. They are offering solutions designed for autonomous operation, rather than retrofitting existing forktrucks.
AutoGuide Max N10 Pallet Stacker Mobile Robot
AutoGuide launched the Max N10 Stacker at the ProMAT show in Chicago this spring. They are on a path to more than double their revenue this year from approximately $4M revenue last year.Teradyne will provide the financial strength and corporate support to help the organization growth to the next level of business.
AutoGuide Max N10 Tugger Mobile Robot
According to AutoGuide president and CEO, Rob Sullivan, “The combined strength of Teradyne’s industrial automation businesses and AutoGuide’s product lines offer new opportunities to create end-to-end automation solutions for customers seeking the safest and most productive material-handling operations from a single source. Teradyne’s financial strength and global reach will help support AutoGuide’s growth, enabling us to maintain our agile approach to the development and deployment of high-value automation systems that bring industry-leading value to our customers.” Andy Blanchard, VP of Corporate Communications for Teradyne said: “We look for these emerging technologies that are reshaping the way that people can do their business in manufacturing and warehouse applications. This is where we see the promise with our acquisition strategy.”Blanchard went on to say “We believe in a mostly hands off, high level support model for the companies in our portfolio. We enable the companies to draw off of our corporate structure and take advantage of our worldwide sales channel to grow their business”.
About AutoGuide Mobile Robots
AutoGuide Mobile Robots designs, develops and manufactures high-payload industrial autonomous mobile robots for assembly, manufacturing, warehousing and distribution operations across multiple industries. AutoGuide’s Max N10 modular mobile robot platform is the industry’s most reliable and affordable natural feature guidance platform with a growing number of application-specific configurations available, including tugger, conveyor deck, car mover and pallet stacker. AutoGuide has a mobile robot R&D center located in Chelmsford, MA and a manufacturing facility in Georgetown, KY. For more information, please visit AGMobileRobots.com
About Teradyne
Teradyne (NASDAQ:TER) brings high-quality innovations such as smart devices, life-saving medical equipment and data storage systems to market, faster. Its advanced test solutions for semiconductors, electronic systems, wireless devices and more ensure that products perform as they were designed. Its Industrial Automation offerings include collaborative and mobile robots that help manufacturers of all sizes improve productivity and lower costs. In 2018, Teradyne had revenue of $2.1 billion and today employs 5,300 people worldwide. For more information, visit teradyne.com. Teradyne® is a registered trademark of Teradyne, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries.
A great addition to the portfolio
Our analysis is that this is a great addition to the Teradyne portfolio. Teradyne has already proven that it understands how to acquire and grow the companies in its portfolio. With the acquisition of MiR, Teradyne was able to help MiR immediately move through the UR reseller and distributor channel worldwide to help quickly grow the MiR sales. The majority of UR channel partners added MiR to their line cards. We would expect the same thing to happen for AutoGuide, especially for those channel partners who sell into the manufacturing and warehouse markets.
We look forward to the next big trade show, where we expect to see an AutoGuide N10 Pallet Stacker picking and placing pallets on and off of a MiR 1000 robot in a demonstration of what will likely be a killer loading dock app for these new siblings.