Kubota has announced the purchase of AgJunction, a company which specialises in automatic steering products.
The purchase is valued at about A$100 million and involves a full buyout of AgJunction, which has its headquarters in the United States and which announced the closure of its Brisbane facilities in 2019.
The purchase should strengthen Kubota’s hand in the growing agricultural automation market, by providing it with access to over 200 patents and patents pending owned and licensed by AgJunction.
These technologies are used by 30 of the world’s leading precision agriculture manufacturers and solution providers, AgJunction says, describing the company’s vision as “bringing affordable hands-free farming to every farm, regardless of terrain or size”.
AgJunction chairwoman Lori Ell says the Kubota purchase will allow for the technology to be accessed by a wider market.
“The transaction is also expected to accelerate the execution of AgJunction’s business plan, enhance access to additional customers and markets, provide efficiencies from greater scale and allows the opportunity for the retention of many AgJunction employees in the go-forward entity,” she says.
The deal is worth $91 million Canadian dollars and is all-cash, representing a value of 75 Canadian cents per share.
Despite having its headquarters in the United States, AgJunction has been listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange.