Liberty Lake’s Telect buys California competitor

A rebounding telecommunications market has helped Liberty Lake-based Telect Inc. buy a small California competitor, the company announced Monday.

Telect officials said they’ve completed the purchase of Hendry Products, a maker of power units, cases and telecom accessories. The company’s Santa Barbara headquarters will close at some point, Telect CEO Wayne Williams said in a press release.

Terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Telect officials believe the move will “conservatively add 25 percent to top-line revenue in 2005,” the press release said.

Telect intends to use Hendry’s Plano, Texas, manufacturing site to continue production of Hendry’s line of equipment, the release said.

Some workers let go at Hendry’s Santa Barbara location will be given the chance to move either to Plano or Liberty Lake.

The purchase is the first for Telect since 2000, Williams said. The company had planned to go public with an initial offering of stock in late 2000, then cancelled the sale when the telecom industry underwent a massive shakeout due to overexpansion and insufficient revenue.

From highs of 2,200 global employees and sales of $265 million in 2000, just three years later Telect had dropped to 220 Liberty Lake workers and about $62 million in sales. Telect officials for the past two years have focused on slow growth and gradual increases in sales and marketing, Williams has said in previous interviews.

Williams said in an e-mail that no other acquisitions are planned. Adding Hendry’s production capacity to Telect’s will create “market advantages and some expansion capabilities,” he said.