DECEMBER 19--Elbit Vision Systems Ltd. (EVS; Yoqneam, Israel), which develops, manufactures, markets, and supports automatic optical inspection and quality monitoring systems for the textile and the nonwoven industries, has signed a term sheet to acquire Yuravision Co. Ltd. (www.yuravision.co.kr), a Korea-based company that develops visual inspection software and systems for the microelectronics industry, as well as flat-panel-display (FPD) and other industrial applications. Following the transaction, Yuravision will be a fully owned subsidiary of EVS. Yuravision' aggregate revenues in 2003 are approximately $1 million, and Yuravision' management forecasts that the revenues for Yuravision products in 2004 will be US$3 million-US$4 million.
Yuravision was established in 1999 by Kim Whoi-Yul and is comanaged by Jung-Un Na. Kim Whoi-Yul heads the computer vision research lab at the Hanyang University in Seoul and is an expert in computer vision and image-processing applications. He has filed around 30 patents in computer vision field; some of them are registered in USA. In machine-vision applications, he has led the team pioneering to develop a number of fastest yet intelligent automatic visual inspection systems for various manufacturing industries.
Jung-Un Na is a senior marketing executive with many years of experience in the microelectronics industry.
EVS president Zami Aberman, said: "This acquisition enables EVS to leverage its textile-inspection activity and apply it to the field of yield-enhancement tools for the microelectronics industry and other industrial applications. With a new base in Korea, our marketing and customer support capabilities will be improved significantly due to our ability to support the needs of major industrial centers in Asia, thereby gaining access to new markets and raising customer satisfaction level.
Yuravision's R&D team is a spin-off from the research lab in the university. The company has developed numerous intelligent machine-vision systems to detect defects in microelectronics and in conventional manufacturing facilities. In microelectronics, Yuravision built TCP and FPD auto-inspection systems for the demand from the Korean/Japan FPD industry. Micro/macro inspection systems built by Yuravision are currently running in major FPD production lines.
