American tech firm indie Semiconductor to buy GEO Semiconductor

American autotech solutions innovator indie Semiconductor will acquire GEO Semiconductor, a private fabless semiconductor company, to increase its market reach in Japan and South Korea.

With the proposed transaction, indie Semiconductor anticipates to add instant scale to the company’s Image Processing program and complete its sensor fusion of Radar, Ultrasound, LiDAR, and Computer Vision solutions in advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) applications.

Under the terms of the agreement, GEO Semiconductor equity and debt holders will receive an aggregate of $180 million at closing, including $90 million in cash plus around 12 million Class A common shares of indie Semiconductor.

In addition, the equity and debt holders could earn up to $90 million more in equity if certain performance targets are exceeded over an 18-month post-closing period.

GEO Semiconductor with 100 global patents, develops camera video processors for automotive viewing and ADAS cameras for automotive OEMs, including Honda, Kia, Hyundai, Toyota, and Nissan.

American tech firm indie Semiconductor to buy GEO Semiconductor

Donald McClymont ­­­- indie Semiconductor co-founder and CEO said: “Camera processing is at the core of the majority of use cases within ADAS applications.

“indie’s acquisition of GEO Semiconductor immediately rounds out our Computer Vision product portfolio with field-proven, differentiated solutions, enabling us to capitalize on the rapid proliferation of automotive image processors.

“Further, this acquisition completes our sensor fusion mosaic spanning Radar, LiDAR, Ultrasound and Computer Vision, bringing us a major step closer towards realizing our strategic vision of enabling the uncrashable car and creating an Autotech powerhouse.”

GEO Semiconductor has design wins across more than 20 Tier 1s and 400 car models to its credit and is involved in multiple electric vehicle (EV) and autonomous vehicle programs.

The San Jose, California-headquartered company has operations in the US, Europe, Canada, Japan, China, South Korea, and Taiwan.

Dave Orton – GEO Semiconductor president and CEO, said: “Leveraging the indie platform and their proven scalability, we can now unleash GEO’s full potential and offer leading Tier 1s and car OEMs unprecedented camera resolution, low latency, power efficiency and ultra-fast processing of image data for enhanced safety systems within next generation vehicles.”

The acquisition is projected to complete in Q1 2023, subject to certain customary closing conditions.