4RF Receives Significant Investment to Accelerate Growth

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• Publié par: fortissimo-capital
• Nombre de lectures: 16
• Langue: English

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4RF Receives Significant Investment to

Accelerate Growth

PR Newswire

WELLINGTON, New Zealand and TEL AVIV, Israel, July 31, 2012

WELLINGTON, New Zealand

and

TEL AVIV, Israel

,

July 31, 2012

/PRNewswire/ --

-

Investment from Fortissimo Capital supports next phase of company's product

development and sales expansion

4RF Limited, the developer of high performance radio communications

equipment for critical infrastructure applications, announces investment from

leading private equity fund Fortissimo Capital. As a result 4RF will expand its

workforce and accelerate the company's product development and sales

globally.

4RF, headquartered in

Wellington, New Zealand

, develops and manufactures

highly robust radio communications equipment for utility, public safety and oil

and gas applications. With this funding, the company's customers in more than

130 countries around the world will benefit from a greatly accelerated

company Growth Plan, with an expanded product range and faster time to

market.

Ian Troughton, CEO of 4RF Limited, comments: "We are seeing a huge demand

for our products, and in the last year our sales have increased by nearly 60%.

We are absolutely thrilled that a leading growth investor in the world's second

largest venture capital market, and indeed the recognised home of wireless

technology, has chosen to invest in 4RF. This investment by Fortissimo marks

the end of a process that we started almost a year ago. Fortissimo is an ideal

partner for 4RF as they share our vision for growth. This is great news for our

customers - with Fortissimo we will be able to accelerate our delivery of new

products to the market."

4RF is accelerating its growth in three ways:

Speeding up the development and launch of next generation products through a

doubling of its R&D team

Adding new variants to the existing product range to address new geographies

Growing sales, marketing and systems engineering to support new business

4RF's radio communications products are renowned throughout the world for

their robustness and reliability, RF (radio frequency) performance and ease of

use through their built in, intuitive software management application. The

company's product portfolio comprises a point-to-point wireless microwave link,

the Aprisa XE, and a point-to-multipoint SCADA / telemetry radio for utility

applications, the Aprisa SR.

Yuval Cohen, Founding and Managing Partner of Fortissimo Capital, comments:

"Our speciality is investing in companies that are at an inflection point: with a

solid customer base, proven sales of world leading technology and a

requirement for growth capital to further enhance operations. We invest in

world-class companies and we are delighted to have found in 4RF a company

that has developed a family of world-class wireless products that can address a

large and growing global smart grid market. 4RF has a great management

team, products of a supremely high standard and blue chip customers

throughout the world. We have huge growth expectations for 4RF and we look

forward to working closely with the team over the coming years."

About Fortissimo Capital

Fortissimo Capital, headquartered in

Israel

, is a group of private equity funds

with nearly

US$500m

under management that invests in global technology

companies that require capital to expand their business. Fortissimo is a long

term investor and seeks to partner with management to facilitate growth and

maximize value. Fortissimo is backed by leading financial institutions including

insurance companies, banks and pension funds.

Fortissimo has successfully exited several of its portfolio companies, including

selling NUR Macroprinters (Nasdaq: NURM) to HP (NYSE: HPQ) for

$123 million

,

selling Cadent to Align Technologies (Nasdaq: ALGN) for

$190 million

, selling

AOD Software to a

USA

private equity firm, and the IPO of SodaStream

(Nasdaq: SODA) and selling its holdings at a valuation of

$800 million

. The

partners in the fund are: Yuval Cohen (founding and managing partner), Eli

Blatt, Shmoulik Barashi, Marc Lesnick, Yochai Hacohen and Yoav Hineman.

Please visit http://www.ffcapital.com for more information about Fortissimo

Capital.

About 4RF Limited

Operating in more than 130 countries, 4RF provides radio communications

equipment for critical infrastructure applications. Customers include utilities, oil

and gas companies, transport companies, telecommunications operators,

international aid organisations and public safety organisations.

4RF has been active in the public safety and utility communications markets

since the company was established, and the company has blue chip customers

around the world in both these markets. With the current large global spending

in these markets, 4RF is well placed to continue offering its world-leading radio

solutions for these critical infrastructure applications. The smart grid market

alone is a multi-billion dollar industry, with communications being a key area of

investment and growth over the next five years and beyond.

Key points:

Established in 1998, with first product sales of Aprisa product family in 2001

Owns all intellectual property, with in-house research and development team

Develops and manufactures market-leading radio communications products, with

unbeatable RF performance, robustness and reliability

Blue chip customers in over 130 countries, including many of the world's largest

utilities, oil and gas companies, telecommunications operators and public safety

organisations

Profitable from 2006 until the financial crisis. Strong growth and rebound in profitability

in year ended

31 March 2012

with highest annual sales orders - a year on year increase

of nearly 60%

Fortissimo's investment supports a greatly accelerated company Growth Plan, with an

expanded product range and faster time to market for large and growing critical

infrastructure market

Please visit http://www.4rf.com for more information about 4RF Limited.

Photographs of key personnel and product are available: please contact

[e-mail]

For further information please contact:

4RF Limited

Ian Troughton, CEO,

[e-mail],

[phone]

Fortissimo Capital

[e-mail]

[phone]

Eisenberg - Eliash Investor relations & Public relations

Amir Eisenberg

[e-mail]

[phone]

Sara Selcer

[e-mail]

[phone]