Kansas City, KA – July 28, 2011 – Rush Tracking Systems and New Castle, Del.-based Sky-Trax, Inc., have merged to form a vertically integrated provider of smart truck tracking systems for manufacturing and warehousing environments, solidifying the combined companies’ market leadership. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
In conjunction with the merger, private equity firm Pharos Capital Group, LLC and its affiliates, owners of Rush Tracking Systems, committed additional capital to the combined company to accelerate growth and increase penetration into international markets.
“Sky-Trax is a natural fit with Rush Tracking Systems, given the companies’ synergistic product offerings, engineering, business and industry expertise,” said Anna Kovalkova, Vice President of Pharos Capital Group. “This business combination is consistent with our original investment strategy in Rush and we will continue to look for additional complementary and synergistic businesses to roll into the new company.”
The new company delivers a comprehensive suite of patented smart truck tracking solutions that optimize personnel safety, asset utilization, labor productivity and inventory accuracy within manufacturing and warehouse operations. By automatically collecting real-time lift truck load and location visibility data, customers are able to reduce or eliminate the inaccuracies associated with driver input of data. The resulting business intelligence data also allows customers to gain the insights needed to implement immediate improvements in accountability, safety and productivity.
“The merger will enhance the ROI to our customers by delivering improved product cost along with real time data and visibility to their operations. As a result, customers can now achieve the next level of actionable business intelligence, directly impacting performance and their bottom line,” states Toby Rush, President of the new company.
The solutions automatically identify the load on the front of a lift truck by leveraging either barcode, RFID, or optical data collection technologies and then track the position of the material handling device via Sky-Trax’s market leading optical indoor positioning system.
“With an installed base of several hundred trucks, and installations around the globe including the United States, Europe and New Zealand, the return has proven to be substantial,” says Mike Kinnard, CEO of the new combined company. “Our customers are experiencing at least 15-20% improvement in productivity and more in many cases.”
The combined entity will continue to sell solutions under the Sky-Trax and Rush Tracking brands and anticipates rapid growth supported by direct sales to blue chip customers as well as growth from a global network of Value Added Resellers (VAR) and Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM).
For more information, visit www.rushtrackingsystems.com or www.sky-trax.com
