Navitar completes sale of coatings division
FEBRUARY 12, 2009--Navitar (Rochester, NY, USA; www.navitar.com), a manufacturer of precision optical systems, has announced the recent sale of Navitar Coating Labs, located in Newport Beach, CA, USA. The company says its decision to sell the coatings division was based on the success of its recent acquisition of Special Optics, a Wharton, NJ firm, which has quadrupled the company's optical design capabilities and expanded its in-house optical coating capabilities.
Navitar's growth began one year ago with the purchase of Special Optics, a firm specializing in the optical design and rapid prototyping of complete electro-optical systems. Additional optical design personnel were added at both the Special Optics facilities and Navitar's Rochester, NY headquarters. Jeremy Goldstein, co-president of Navitar, comments, "The purchase of Special Optics was the beginning of a dramatic surge in our design efforts and the rapid development of next-generation optical systems. Navitar is now one of the few optical companies that can seamlessly integrate optical and mechanical engineering, rapid prototyping, and volume custom lens production in one operation."
According to Navitar, with in-house optical coating capabilities at the Special Optics facilities in New Jersey, the Navitar Coating Labs facility in Newport Beach, CA became a non-core asset. Formerly GM Vacuum Coating Laboratory, Navitar Coating Labs was originally purchased in 1998 and has remained a separate organization with its own customer base.
One hundred percent of the shares of Navitar Coating Labs were purchased for an undisclosed amount by its president, Dan Coursen. The company name will soon be changed to Coursen Coating Labs with a new web site at www.coursencoatinglabs.com.
"We are very pleased to have reached this agreement and to have sold Navitar Coating Labs to its management. The transition will be seamless to Navitar Coating Labs customers as they have always been serviced by the same core management group and will continue to receive the outstanding service they have come to expect," says co-president Julian Goldstein.