June 27, 2013 – Datamax-O’Neil Recent Acquisition

Datamax-O’Neil takes over the thermal printer assets of Source Technology, one of the leading providers of specialized printing solutions, how will Datamax- O’Neil handle the innovative technologies of Source technologies, will they use their resources to expand it or let it die out and fade into history.

You know in those action movies where you see the group of guys rush a building where the enemy is hold up take over with the full force and extent of power, or the medieval movies where the massive armies storm a castle to take control of it. Well the Datamax- O’Neil acquisition of Source Technologies Thermal printer assets was nothing like those. Although that would be really cool to see. The takeover was probably carried out in a giant board room filled with business men drink coffee and talking terms of their agreement. The point still stands however Datamax has acquired the thermal printing assets of Source Technology. Which poses three questions, why did they buy it? How will they integrate it? And what will happen to it?

So will start with the natural question is what did the buy it? Source technologies is small not the most known so why does a printing market giant such as Datamax- O’Neil want a printer line such as these. Well the printer company is small but have dedicated themselves to using the most advanced technology to turn inspired ideas into solutions on a world class level. This dedication has lead them to being a leader in specialized printing gain more than 25 patents. The thermal printing assets they bought alone represent over three years of development and intense research along with considerable company investment resulting in 12 provisional patents. All ST Performance series printers are designed to be easy to integrate, by using PCL5e, an industry standard printer language, which eliminates integration difficulties often caused by proprietary languages. The printers themselves offer easy to use, and reliability and performance at an affordable price.

So now that they bought it how will they integrate it? The saddest thing that can happen to an acquisitions is an unplanned integration plan that ultimately leads to the product not selling or never being integrated into the system just sitting dormant. However this doesn’t look like the case, the Source Technologies printer assets are projected to be fully integrated into the Datamax- O’ Neil system over a two month period, being marketed under the Datamax- O’Neil name. The engineering team that’s was based in Florida will be moved over to Datamax-O’Neil Orlando, Florida operation center.

Which just leaves what will happen to it? I have always been eerie of major asset acquisitions, especially between a big and small company. Their just too much of a size imbalance. That size imbalance sometimes causes the death of great programs. These printers are a great innovation I would hate to see the programs go to waste. For this question there is no real answer they moved the engineers to their Florida base so one can only assume there are going to continue to research and the program will end up flourishing with the companies extra resources. This however is the ideal workings of an acquisitions, we cannot forget that things don’t always go to plan and sometimes programs like this don’t end up getting the attention they deserve.

In the end I can’t wait to see the development of these newly acquired products of Datamax I hope that these products flourish and expand in Datamax-O’Neil and don’t just become one of those transactions that that just fade into history.