Azzurri Technology has more than doubled its sales in France with the acquisition of specialist semiconductor distributor Micro Puissance.

“With sales of around £12m this acquisition significantly strengthens our market position in France,” Azzurri’s CEO Mike Carlucci told Electronics Weekly. Currently, the UK firm does around £5m worth of business in the French market.

Carlucci said the French market had long been a target, but finding the right company was not straight-forward.

Carlucci: Strong position in France

“Finding the right company is never easy but from the first meeting with Micro Puissance it was obvious that the market strategies and culture of the two companies were almost identical,” he said.

In September, Azzurri signed up Cirrus Logic in France as well as the UK and Italy.

Founded in 1988, Micro Puissance has positioned itself on the French market as a specialist design-in distributor. The firm carries the CSR Bluetooth chipset line in France.

“Micro Puissance is CSR’s largest European distributor,” said Carlucci.

According to Carlucci, its three focus markets are power management, for which it has the Ricoh and Torex lines; multimedia, with the Gennum, Wolfson and Conexant lines; and communications with Bluetooth modules from Mitsumi and Ezurio. It also carries Zigbee chips from Ember and modules from Telegesis.

“Azzurri and Micro Puissance have so many similarities that it should be a perfect match. I am certain that my team will have more development opportunities being part of a larger European group,” said Jean Marie Rousseau, president of Micro Puissance.

www.azzurri.com