Atec Buys Assets of Nexar, Enters PC Manufacturing.

Atec Group Inc, the Hauppauge, New York-based systems integration firm, has acquired the patents and trademarks of Nexar Technologies Inc, the Southborough, Massachusetts-based PC manufacturer which commenced insolvency proceedings at the end of last year. In a court approved deal, Atec paid around $300,000 for the rights to Nexar's XPA PC cross processor architecture, and has persuaded Nexar's key management to join Atec.

Formed in 1995, Nexar developed a so-called "future proof" PC, designed with a split motherboard and easy access chassis to make processor upgrades easier. The XPA architecture attempts to separate the parts of the PC that are most susceptible to rapid changes and advancements - such as processor, chipset and memory - from the rest of the PC. Nexar originally anticipated that the use of Alpha and other chips might be a user requirement, but more recently concentrated on its ability to provide easier upgrades for the Intel chip family, from the Pentium through to Pentium Pro, Pentium II, Dual Pentium II and beyond.

But Nexar, which made $34m in revenues for its year ending December 1997, found itself struggling when the price of PCs plummeted last year. It failed to secure extra funding and began to look for a larger partner. The company was delisted from the Nasdaq Exchange in December.

Atec plans to establish a new manufacturing technology division using the Nexar name. Al Agbay, former chairman, CEO and president of Nexar will head the new division, which Atec says it expects to contribute over $100m in sales and $3m in net income in the first year of its operation. Gross margins are expected to exceed 20%. Earlier this year Atec set up a Year 2000 division (based on last year's acquisition of Logix Solutions, Inc) and a new internet service division. The company saw its revenues grow 87% last year to $187.2m from $100.8m the previous year, and generated net income of $13.7m.