Zebra Technologies Acquires Matrox Imaging

Zebra Technologies will acquire Matrox Imaging, the Montreal-based provider of machine vision components and systems and a division of Matrox Electronic Systems Ltd. The $875 million deal marks the mobile computing company’s third major acquisition in the machine vision space in the last year. Zebra Technologies expects the transaction to close this year.

Matrox Imaging offers platform-independent software, software development kits, smart cameras, 3D sensors, vision controllers, input/output cards, and frame grabbers that are used to capture, inspect, assess, and record data from industrial vision systems in factory automation, electronics and pharmaceutical packaging, semiconductor inspection, and more. These capabilities enable industrial customers to lower the cost of manufacturing products, improve product quality, and increase compliance and yield.

“Customers are increasingly deploying automated solutions to augment their frontline workers, enabling them to focus on more complex, higher-value workflows, and machine vision is a key technology to help them get there,” Zebra Technologies' CEO Anders Gustafsson said. “This acquisition enables us to meet our customers’ evolving needs, regardless of where they are on their automation journey — from capturing and analyzing data to facilitate decision-making, to deploying physical automation solutions to accelerate the production and movement of goods and materials.”

Zebra Technologies entered the machine vision market in May 2021 when it acquired software company Adaptive Vision, concurrent with its release of a line of fixed industrial scanners and smart cameras. Matrox Imaging’s solutions complement Zebra’s fixed industrial scanning and machine vision portfolio, Zebra said.

In July 2021, Zebra acquired Fetch Robotics, an intralogistics automation company and a developer of autonomous mobile robots.

The Matrox Video division, Matrox Graphics Inc., is not part of the transaction and will remain under the ownership of Matrox president and co-founder Lorne Trottier. The head offices of both the Matrox Imaging division and the Matrox Video division will remain in Montreal.

Matrox Imaging generates annual sales of approximately $100 million and has a higher profit margin profile than Zebra. In February, Zebra announced 2021 net sales of nearly $1.5 billion, a year-over-year increase of 12.2%.