British acquire RAM Electronics

FORT COLLINS – International engineering firm Siebe plc has snatched up RAM Electronics Corp. of Fort Collins for $3.6 million.RAM Electronics, a manufacturer of electronic controls for gas-fired appliances such as water heaters, furnaces and boilers, will join forces with Siebe’s Robertshaw Grayson business unit, one of the world’s leaders in heating, ventilation and air-conditioning gas valves.
The move aligns the Fort Collins company with one of the United Kingdom’s largest engineering groups. Siebe incorporates more than 150 companies worldwide and employs more than 50,000 in the design and manufacture of temperature and appliance controls, electronic power controls, process automation and building control systems and engineered industrial equipment.
“This is a very positive step forward for RAM,´ said company executive vice president Chris Edwards. “By working with an international company the size of Siebe, we’ll have access to more resources and greatly expanded markets worldwide. We’ll be able to improve our customer service, engineering innovation and manufacturing capabilities.”
The partnership is one RAM Electronics has been working on for some time. Edwards said the 21-year-old company adjusted its strategy and started looking for partners more than a year ago and found an attractive match in Robertshaw. The two companies started doing business, and the partnership grew until Robertshaw suggested a more formal alliance.
The acquisition, undertaken by Siebe’s U.S.-based HVACR Division, means Siebe can offer its customers Robertshaw’s gas products complemented by RAM’s circuit-board ignition systems.
Siebe generated sales of $5 billion for the year ended April 5, 1997, and company president Robert Hitt stated expectations of rapid growth for the company over the next few years.
RAM Electronics posted sales of $6.4 million last year and currently operates in Europe, Australia and the United States. The company employs between 50 and 60 people, but Edwards said he expects that to increase.
“Definite plans are not yet set, but we expect that this will be very favorable for Colorado,” he said.
RAM Electronics was formed in 1976 to produce and market an ignition-control system for commercial dryers. The company set up a manufacturing plant in Taiwan and a smaller office in California, but by 1980, brought all manufacturing operations back to the United States for quality control.
Original principals Bill Runyan, Al Hayes and Dr. Paul Mu derived the company name from the first letters of their names. Runyan sold his stock to Hayes and left the company in 1977, and Mu served as chairman until 1992, when he also sold his stock to Hayes.
Purchase of the company by Siebe constitutes the latest in a series of acquisitions of local companies by multinational conglomerates. Data Entry Products of Loveland was acquired last year by Lucas Industries plc, a British automotive and aerospace systems supplier, and Fiscal Information Inc. of Loveland was purchased last month by Reynolds and Reynolds Co., a supplier of integrated information-management systems.