Harmonic buys Omneon

Harmonic announced this week they were purchasing Omneon for $190M cash plus quite a bit of stock (estimated deal value is $274M).  Many who read here regularly may not be totally familiar with either of these companies (particularly if they work more on the new media side of things).  Well, Harmonic is a creator of video delivery solutions for broadcasters traditionally, though they have been creeping into the Internet video space for quite awhile (a few years back they purchased Rhozet, makers of Carbon Coder (who spun out of Canopus).  Omneon is focused on storage solutions for the video space and likewise have been primarily sold into broadcast and post production type facilities.  

Together, the companies have more than 2,000 customers across 100 countries, with two-thirds of Omneon’s business coming from outside the United States last year. The combined workforce will include 450 engineers working in research and development, and 580 in sales and service--a total of 1,030 people. Harmonic now has 840 employees, Omneon has 280 for a grand total of 1,120. 

Harmonic also reported the executive team from Omneon is expected to join and no news was announced regarding possible layoffs.

 It will be quite interesting to see how two pretty large companies in this space get on together.  Their technologies play very well together in a number of ways, but I have to imagine we'll see quite a bit from them about turnkey solutions for the "TV Everywhere" crowd.