In recent years, in the industrial robot industry, there have been reports of Chinese companies going out to sea to acquire, and the acquisition of the German robot giant Kuka by the United States is one of the famous cases.

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI On December 3, Jiangsu Hagong Intelligent Robot Co., LTD. (hereinafter referred to as: Hagong Intelligent) announced the progress of the acquisition of 100% equity of Germany NIMAK GmbH, NIMAK KG and Nickel GmbH (hereinafter referred to as: NIMAK Group) : Due to the complexity of the cross-border merger and acquisition, the parties to the transaction were unable to reach all the closing conditions within the agreed closing conditions deadline (by November 30, 2019).

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI According to the relevant agreement, both the buyer and the seller can withdraw from the above transaction without prior notice. However, as of the date of disclosure of the announcement, both sides have not yet withdrawn from the transaction, and Harbin Industrial Intelligence is actively negotiating with the seller on the follow-up matters of the acquisition.

Through the observer network combing, in addition to Harbin industrial intelligence, in recent years, listed companies Eston, sprint science and technology innovation board Eft and other countries have also tentacles into Italy, the United Kingdom, Germany and other countries.

The NIMAK acquisition has not yet landed

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI According to the original plan, Harbin Industrial Intelligence should have acquired the NIMAK Group, which is good at producing robots for the automotive industry, for 64,483,300 euros before the end of November, and the latter mainly produces robot welders, robot welders, robot gluing machines and other automatic equipment, whose product application fields cover automobiles, home appliances, aerospace and so on.

Industrial robots of the NIMAK Group

It is understood that NIMAK Group currently occupies more than 80% of the market share in high-end automobile brands, and the market share of high-end and mainstream automobile companies exceeds 50%, which is called the “hidden champion” in the field of industrial welding.

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI The deal began on October 25. At that time, Hagong Intelligence planned to buy 100% of NIMAK Group in cash.

However, the deal did not close as scheduled.

On June 1 this year, Harbin Industrial Intelligence issued an announcement, saying that according to the relevant agreement of the Share Purchase Agreement, the parties to the transaction plan to reach the relevant delivery conditions and enter the delivery stage before May 31 this year. However, due to the complexity of cross-border mergers and acquisitions, the parties to the transaction were unable to reach the relevant delivery conditions within the original schedule. As of 1 June, the parties had not yet reached a written agreement. At present, the parties to the transaction are actively working on a new planned delivery date.

Three days later (June 4), Harbin Industrial Intelligence announced again that because some of its subsidiaries such as NIMAK GmbH are expected to be difficult to reach the delivery conditions, after negotiation between the parties to the transaction, the equity structure and delivery scope of the target company were adjusted.

Of the three target companies, Nickel GmbH is a general partner of NIMAK KG, and Nickel GmbH has no subsidiaries; After NIMAK International transferred 100% of NIMAK North America to NIMAK GmbH, NIMAK KG completed the divestiture of NIMAK International, leaving NIMAK GmbH with two subsidiaries (NIMAK North America and NIMAK Mexico) and NIMAK KG no longer having subsidiaries.

Due to the change in the delivery range, the transaction consideration, as agreed by the parties, is approximately €64,483,300.

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI Eston successfully “swallowed” Cruise

Compared with the acquisition of Hagong Intelligence, which has not yet “blossomed”, Nanjing Eston Automation (hereinafter referred to as: Eston) acquired the veteran German industrial robot manufacturer Cruz Group (CLOOS).

According to the announcement released by Eston on November 1, its acquisition of Cruise Group has been approved by the German government for foreign investment, and has been approved or filed by the Jiangsu Provincial Development and Reform Commission, the Jiangsu Provincial Department of Commerce and other relevant government departments; The purchase price for the 100% equity of Cruise Group was paid in full and the equity delivery was completed on October 31, 2019.

SR745-W2-P5-G5-HI Eston’s third quarterly report revealed that the transaction value of the acquisition reached 196 million euros.

It is understood that Cruise Group is known for manufacturing welding robots for welding automotive steel plates, and has independently developed and produced welding robots since 1981, which is one of the first companies in the world to have fully autonomous welding robot technology and products.

Cruise Group has 11 subsidiaries and 9 production sites in the world, including China, the United Kingdom, Hungary, Austria and North America, etc., providing unique robot welding solutions in various industries such as rail transportation, agricultural machinery, construction machinery, shipbuilding and chemical industry.

Cruise is Eston Automation’s fifth overseas acquisition.

As a Chinese emerging enterprise whose main business is welding robots for the automotive and home appliance industries, Eston was founded in 1993 and listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in 2015. After going public, Eston began its own overseas acquisition expansion.

In February 2016, Eston acquired 20% of Euclid Labs, an Italian machine vision company, for 1.4 million euros, which was founded in 2005 and has mastered the world’s leading robot 3D vision technology, robot offline programming and intelligent operation technology.

In February 2017, Eston spent £15.5 million to acquire all the shares of TRIO. TRIO is committed to providing high-precision and high-reliability motion control technology for industrial automation, and was already one of the world’s leading motion control companies when acquired by Eston.

In April of that year, Eston paid $9 million for a 30% stake in Barrett Technology, an American robotics company focused on the research and manufacturing of micro-servo drives, human-machine collaborative intelligent robots and medical rehabilitation robots.

In September, Eston acquired half of German robotic systems integrator M.A.i. to broaden its integration experience in the automotive engine and electronic system components, semiconductors, aerospace components and medical devices industries. Four months later, the M.A.i. digital factory was officially launched in China.