the LASEA group, one of the world leaders for the design and manufacture of precision laser machines, announces the purchase of the majority shares of the OPTEC company. Based in Frameries (Belgium) and in San Diego (USA), OPTEC is specialised in UV and ultra-short pulse lasers with a strong presence in the USA and Asia. The new Group offers all subtractive and additive laser solutions for 4 preferred sectors (Luxury Goods, Medical, Electronics, Academic).
Thanks to this merger, the Belgian group based in Wallonia, has achieved a critical size on the world stage. With more than 110 employees in 4 countries, more than 1000 systems installed on 5 continents and counting several clients who are giants in the Luxury Goods, Medical and Electronics industries and the most prestigious Universities, it confirms its strategic position as the European Leader in micromachining applications.
OPTEC, the Mons based high-tech company, pioneer in athermal laser micro-machining
Founded in 1991 and born out of the LABEL company, a spin-off from the University of Mons, OPTEC designs and manufactures laser micro-machining machines for the medical and electronics sectors and for safety marking. For over 30 years, it has specialised in precision machining of polymer materials using Excimer lasers (short pulse, UV lasers). It is also a major player in the field of ultra-short pulse lasers. These two athermal processes are capable of micron-size precision, offering very high performances both from a quality and a reliability point of view for the most cutting-edge applications. Installed in Frameries since 2003, it has gradually expanded its facilities in 2005 and 2016 in order to meet growing demand coming from Japan (Beams Inc.) & the United States (OPTEC LLC). Today, OPTEC occupies a surface area in Belgium of more than 1500 m², 100 m² of which are ISO7 class clean rooms and has a subsidiary in San Diego (USA). 600 laser systems (standard or customised) have been sold worldwide. OPTEC also owns a patented ceramic machining technology (MachCeram®) that allows single or series parts of impressive quality to be rapidly produced.
LASEA, the Liège based high-tech company, pioneer in ultra-short pulse laser micromachining
With an organic annual growth of 32% since 2012, in 7 years, LASEA has multiplied its revenue and number of employees by a factor of 7. Becoming the European leader in femtosecond laser micromachining, it is rapidly increasing its market share in the USA and Japan. LASEA machines can be used for cutting, marking, engraving, drilling, thin film ablation and texturing of materials with unequalled quality and precision (up to 0.2µm, i.e. 250 times less than the diameter of a hair). With cutting-edge R&D on the international level, it regularly introduces innovations well ahead of the state-of-the-art straight cutting, bio-mimicry, simultaneous 7-axes machining, and more). With this merger, LASEA reinforces its position in the luxury goods sector with ceramic machining (MachCeram® patent) and pursues its diversification undertaken several years ago in new sectors.
An obvious merger with high sales potential
The success of the merger between our two companies will be very easy to achieve as the companies are close and already share common values (customer satisfaction, innovation, agility, continuous improvement). The new group has now achieved a critical size on the world market. With OPTEC, we accumulate more than 50 years of experience in pulsed lasers and nearly 30 years in ultra-short pulse lasers! We are delighted to welcome the passionate and successful OPTEC team to the LASEA group.
Our technological and commercial synergies are obvious. We are convinced that our respective customers will benefit from the pooling of our operations and that our new products will continue to meet the demands of rapidly growing marketsAxel KupisiewiczCEO of LASEA
Through LASEA and OPTEC, we are fortunate in Wallonia to have two high-technology companies with cutting-edge, complimentary technical skills in the field of Laser machining. By pooling our skills and our innovations, we can that much better meet the needs of our customers thanks to our passionate,
specialised teams. Like our beautiful country’s motto: “l’union fait la force” [Strength through Union], each of us can apply our talents to be even betterLaurent MarinCEO of OPTEC
Wallonie, at the heart of Europe & with a long standing engineering tradition, can be proud to be home to TWO prestigious laser micromachining system builders. I think it was inevitable that at some point we would want to pool our resources & become a major player on the world stage. It is an exciting new chapter for Optec, and has the full support of our US & Japanese partnersRod AndrewOPTEC founder
With more than 110 employees in 4 countries and a machine fleet of more than 1000 laser machines, distributed throughout 5 continents, the new group accumulates more than 50 years of experience in precision laser micro-machining. With this acquisition, LASEA also confirms its position as European leader in ultra-short pulse laser technology.
Contact:
Violette Marbehant
Marketing Account Manager
vmarbehant@lasea.com
Tel. : +32 4 365 02 43 / +32 497 43 46 63
