AD-EX International-West

Salt Lake City-based Marathon Exhibits, which has developed a global reputation for developing some of the most innovative exhibit environments for famously creative clients such as DreamWorks, recently announced that it has been acquired by Cincinnati-based AD-EX International, a leading provider of comprehensive exhibition and event marketing products and services.

With the acquisition, Marathon Exhibits, housed in its new facilities in Salt Lake City, became AD-EX International-West. The AD-EX International global headquarters is located in Cincinnati, and the entity has additional offices in Chicago and Denver. The company’s offices are strategically
located, with a presence in close proximity to every major U.S. city.

“By combining the native strengths of both Marathon and AD-EX, this new combined AD-EX International organization provides great benefits to the world-class clients of both companies,” says Cregg Cannon, who co-founded Marathon Exhibits with Jeremy Walker and Allen Dellinger. Cannon is now managing director of the AD-EX International-West office, and Walker and Dellinger will also provide leadership for the combined entity. “Our clients will enjoy an experience unique in the marketplace, from concept development to finished product, and this will be a great adventure for the entire Marathon team.”

“This merger significantly broadens and deepens the AD-EX client base to encompass services and entertainment as well as consumer products, IT and healthcare,” says Tim Murphy, founder and president of AD-EX International. “We have experienced tremendous energy and synergy in our work together, and we look forward to building on the strong relationship of trust we have built with the team at Marathon Exhibits.”

Founded in October 2002, Marathon Exhibits quickly established itself as a leader of creative exhibition and event marketing solutions for visionary companies, including Axiom, DreamWorks, EnergySolutions, Fisher Price, Kicker, LANDesk, Mattel, Melaleuca, Medicity, Miramar Systems, Network Electronics, Novell, The Olpin Group, Sorenson Communications and Tuff Country.    

Founded in 1978, AD-EX International serves a Who’s Who of established global players, such as Avolar/United Airlines, Cook, GSK, IBM, JohnsonDiversey, Lexmark, Lenovo, Mitsubishi, NCR, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, Reynolds & Reynolds, Sanofi-Aventis, Toyota and Viva.  

The AD-EX International-Marathon Exhibits merger is the culmination of a
successful strategic partnership between the two organizations that has included several multi-million-dollar collaborative projects during the past four years. 

Following Acquisition,
LANDesk Launches New Offerings

In the wake of being acquired by Avocent in one of the largest private equity deals in Utah history, LANDesk Software is pursuing an aggressive market strategy: releasing new product and service offerings and working with industry giant Intel to produce a major IT business summit.

In September, LANDesk and Alabama-based Avocent completed the strategic acquisition of LANDesk for approximately $400 million—$200 million each in cash and stock. Avocent also expects ot issue approximately 85,000 restricted stock units to certain LANDesk employes with a total value of approximately $2.6 million. There were no planned layoffs as a result of the acquisition, and LANDesk will continue to be headquartered in Utah.

Since the acquisition was announced, LANDesk has launched a number of major offerings, including LANDesk Process Manager 2.0 and 3.0 and the LANDesk Service Desk. Process Manager 2.0, announced summer 2006, is a change management solution and business process management “engine” created to help clients automate repetitive or manual processes and to manage small- or large-scale organizational changes.

The software was quickly followed by Process Manager 3.0, which helps organizations define and follow processes for software distribution, operating system imaging, configuration management, security and patch management, and vulnerability scanning and remediation.

“Our customers have come to us requesting more than just another toolset for patch management or software distribution. They want us to help them define processes around their key pain points and needs, and then automate the approvals, execute the functions and tasks, and provide reports for compliance and regulatory requirements,” said Dave R. Taylor, vice president of worldwide marketing for LANDesk.

In July, LANDesk released Service Desk, which resulted from a licensing agreement and strategic partnership with United Kingdom-based business management solutions provider Touchpaper. The Service Desk solution utilizes standardization and automation that enables clients to provide enhanced support and services to customers and employees. It was developed as part of an integrated suite of LANDesk products and services, including the company’s Management Suite, Security Suite and Process Manager.

“LANDesk Service Desk represents our continued march toward helping IT departments automate business processes for organization-wide efficiency and leverage technology to its fullest potential,” says Taylor.  

Utah’s VC Firms Encouraged
by Economic Environment

Considered by some as the “life blood” of a strong economy, Utah’s venture capital firms are poised to make an even more significant impact on companies in the state.

“There are some very positive things that are here in Utah that we see in other parts of the country, but not that many [parts of the country],” Mark Heesen, president of the National Venture Capital Association, told a gathering of local VC firms in 2006.

Among the 50 states, Utah ranks 15th in venture capital funding, up from 35th 10 years ago. California holds the No. 1 spot with a strong 50 percent of the venture capital funding nationally.

Heesen, along with local venture capital gurus such as Todd Stevens and Dinesh Patel, sees venture capital in Utah becoming a stronger force behind corporate success. A major factor contributing to the bright future is the environment being created by state government to encourage economic development, especially in relation to university research.

“Tech transfer cannot be underestimated,” Heesen said, referring to commercialization of research produced by major universities. “There is a reason why Silicon Valley is what it is today, and I think that reason is because of Stanford’s extremely good tech transfer program.”

Just as Stanford University has played a large role in the development of technology companies in California, initiatives such as Utah Science Technology and Research (USTAR), Centers of Excellence and Tech Transfer at the University of Utah have been implemented to help students and professors commercialize new ideas.

Beyond efforts on the university level, Gov. Jon Huntsman, Jr. outlined two other areas where Utah is helping create the environment that is needed—tax reform and defining the state’s strengths.

“In today’s world there’s no excuse to not be competitive,” Huntsman said, acknowledging Utah’s role in the international scene. “We all share a common platform called the Internet… That’s why quality of life is so important. A conducive and propitious economic environment has got to be coupled with quality of life.”

Heesen agreed, “Quality of life is an extremely important element today to entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. The world is, in fact, getting flatter.”

A challenge Utah has typically had in growing companies is that once they reach a certain size, they have outgrown the business environment here and need to move to another area. Heesen encouraged VCs in Utah, however, saying quality of life and advanced communication technology will persuade entrepreneurs to stay in the state and VC firms to fund more local ventures.

Venture capital firms are being much more prudent since the burst of the dot-com bubble five years or so ago, Heesen said, and although less money is being invested than it has been historically, the investors are looking for better companies and a solid economic environment like Utah’s.

“As larger venture capital firms [outside of Utah] have faith n the local firms, you are going to see more deals done here,” he said. “Good local venture capital firms will breed bigger firms and attract larger VC firms outside of the region to come here.”

Symantec Acquisition of Altiris Gets Stockholder Go-ahead

In April, Altiris stockholders voted to approve the acuisition by California-based Symantec Corp. Under the terms of the agreement, Altiris stockholders will receive $33 per share of Altiris common stock in cash, without interest, resulting in a transaction value of approximately $830 million net-of-cash-acquired.

According to a press release from Symantec, the acquisition of Altiris is expected to bolster its position on the enterprise endpoint. Symantec helps businesses protect their endpoints with leading security, compliance, and backup and recovery solutions for mobile devices and PCs as well as servers and storage assets. With the Altiris solutions, Symantec expects to be able to help customers better manage security policies at the endpoint, identify and protect against threats, and service assets.

“By combining the endpoint management solutions from Altiris with the security expertise from Symantec, we believe we can offer customers a more comprehensive solution to protect and manage the millions of connected devices that make up the fabric of today’s global IT infrastructure,” said John W. Thompson, chairman and chief executive officer, Symantec.

Altiris solutions are aimed at reducing the cost and complexity of tracking, supporting and maintaining an organization’s corporate IT assets, including desktops, laptops, servers, and handheld devices.

“Today’s IT departments are faced with constant pressures to manage spiraling IT complexity at the lowest possible cost. We have made it our goal to help businesses reduce the cost and complexity of IT, improve system and data security, and better align IT service with corporate objectives,” said Greg Butterfield, president and chief executive officer of Altiris, in a press release. “By combining our software solutions, services, and channel distribution strengths, Symantec and Altiris can offer our customers the ‘total package’ in endpoint management.”

Maxstream Sale Fetches a Cool $38.5 Million

Lindon-based Maxstream, a global developer of wireless modem networking for electronic devices, was acquired by Minnesota-based Digi International, a developer of products and technologies for the networking of electronic devices. 

MaxStream supplies wireless modules and box products that allow device manufacturers and integrators to wirelessly monitor and control electronic devices for applications ranging from utility reading to vehicle access information for trucking fleet management to the monitoring of oil and gas, heating and air conditioning systems. The company employs 49 people and generated revenues of $10.4 million in 2005. Digi projects sales of $20-24 million for MaxStream in 2007.

Terms of the agreement included equal parts—$19.25 million each—cash and Digi stock. MaxStream will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Digi and will retain its Utah headquarters.

“What a great opportunity this is for MaxStream to join with a company that has such a great reputation in the industry,” says Brad Walters, president and CEO of MaxStream. “Culturally, the two companies are very compatible and we’re really looking forward to jointly addressing the rapidly growing wireless market.”

“This is really an exciting combination —the strategic fit between the two companies is remarkable,” adds Joe Dunsmore, chairman, president and CEO of Digi. “Our product lines are entirely complementary. We’re both focused on the commercial-grade device networking market and our core strategies of providing turnkey box products and embedded modules are the same.”

Walters noted that MaxStream was contacted by numerous companies during the past several years, including several public companies and VC funds.

“We could have done a bigger financial deal with some of the other interested organizations,” he says, “but not the same fit with the same quirky and smart-alecky yet assertive and accountable corporate culture, or the same ideal product alignment. The irony is that in conversations with members of the team, we used to remark that it would be great if we could get Digi to take an interest in us. When they did, we knew it was the right fit.”