Friday, February 19, 2010

SMSC Acquires Kleer Semiconductor Corporation

HAUPPAUGE, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SMSC (NASDAQ: SMSC - News), a leading semiconductor company providing Smart Mixed-Signal Connectivity™ solutions, today announced that it has acquired substantially all the assets and certain liabilities of Kleer Semiconductor Corporation (Kleer), a designer of high quality, interoperable wireless audio technology addressing headphones and earphones, home audio/theater systems and speakers, portable audio/media players and automotive sound systems. This transaction brings a robust, high-quality audio and low-power radio frequency (RF) capability that will allow consumer and automotive OEMs to integrate wireless audio technology into portable audio devices and sound systems without compromising high-grade audio quality or battery life.

“Kleer technology provides a natural extension to SMSC’s consumer and automotive connectivity portfolio,” said Christine King, President & Chief Executive Officer of SMSC. “With its Media Oriented Systems Transport (MOST®) technology, SMSC’s automotive product line already provides a wired network that allows passengers to enjoy multimedia content without sacrificing quality or performance. MOST is widely recognized as the de-facto standard to move high-bandwidth content among various components within the vehicle. Kleer technology provides a high quality wireless extension of MOST without quality degradation and with low power consumption. This technology extends our ability to service our OEM customers with a broad portfolio of solutions that significantly enhance the user experience in the car and elsewhere.”

Kleer-based products are designed to provide high quality media transmission in various environments with strong interference robustness and WiFi coexistence to enhance the user experience. The technology has many natural applications in the consumer world to create high-fidelity home theater environments and distribute audio in the home and other environments. Several consumer customers already offer products with Kleer technology, including Sennheiser, the well-known headphone brand, which offers several models of digital wireless headphones and earbuds with high audio quality and long battery life. TDK recently introduced the highly-regarded Kleer-based TH-WR700 wireless headphones. In addition, DigiFi’s wireless earbuds and CyFi’s speaker system for bicycles both rely on Kleer’s low power consumption.

Under terms of the asset purchase agreement, SMSC paid approximately $5.5 million in cash and additional cash payments of up to $2.0 million may occur upon achievement of certain performance goals. The acquisition closed on February 16, 2010.