Lasers & Sources

QinetiQ acquires semiconductor laser maker Redfern Integrated Optics

June 7, 2014

Defense, aerospace, and security company QinetiQ Group acquired Redfern Integrated Optics (RIO), a manufacturer of low-noise semiconductor lasers.

Gail Overton

Defense, aerospace, and security company QinetiQ Group (Farnborough, England) acquired Redfern Integrated Optics (RIO; San Francisco, CA), a manufacturer of low-noise semiconductor lasers, with a turnover of $5 million dollars in 2013. The acquisition accelerates the development of OptaSense, a QinetiQ subsidiary, providing the business with secure access to the engineering team developing the current and future generations of highly coherent, low-noise semiconductor lasers.

RIO supplies lasers to the sensing industry with more than ten years of experience in delivering products to the fiber geophone, LIDAR, and distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) markets. Backed by a consortium of venture capital funds led by Southern Cross Ventures and Jolimont Capital, RIO was the first company to develop a commercially viable semiconductor laser with sufficient stability for DAS applications.

Leo Quinn, QinetiQ CEO, said, "This acquisition of RIO is an important step in ensuring that OptaSense realises its full potential as the global leader in distributed acoustic sensing. We are committed to supporting the high-growth businesses in our portfolio, accelerating their development as appropriate with acquisitions and partnerships. This acquisition has natural synergies with OptaSense and secures its access to a key supplier in the market."

Magnus McEwen-King, OptaSense managing director, said, "We have been working with RIO for many years and are impressed with the technical capabilities of the team. Their products are ideally suited to the distributed fibre sensing market especially within the oil & gas sector where high performance and high reliability in harsh environments are essential. We see demand for RIO's laser products continuing to grow across the whole fibre sensing market and look forward to supporting their existing customer base. Through this acquisition we also gain the ability to shape the future developments of their products to further improve the technical performance of our DAS offerings especially in the seismic monitoring market."

Larry Marshall, chairman of RIO and managing director of Southern Cross Ventures, said, "OptaSense has made an excellent strategic acquisition and will greatly enhance RIO's ability to scale their unique technology across a broader range of markets and customers than would normally be accessible to a small start-up. Our team and investors are pleased that RIO secured such an exceptional partner who will support our customers."

RIO will be integrated with OptaSense but will continue to use the RIO brand name. The transaction is expected to complete within the first half of QinetiQ’s financial year and is subject to normal regulatory approvals.

SOURCE: QinetiQ; http://www.qinetiq.com/media/news/releases/Pages/qinetiq-acquires-market-leading-laser-technology-company.aspx

About the Author

Gail Overton | Senior Editor (2004-2020)

Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.