Seagate to acquire Mac storage provider LaCie for $186 million

The all-cash deal is valued at 4.05 euros per share, with Seagate to acquire 64.5 percent of LaCie's outstanding shares from Philippe Spruch, the company's chairman and CEO, as well as his affiliate. The offer from Seagate values LaCie at 146 million euros, or $186 million U.S., including acquired net cash of about 49 million euros, or $65 million U.S., as of March 31, 2012.

The two companies said the acquisition will combine two highly complementary product and technology portfolios, adding LaCie's premium consumer storage solutions and network-attached storage products to Seagate's consumer storage products. Seagate sees the deal accelerating its growth strategy in the consumer storage market, particularly in Europe and Japan, as well as adding engineering and software capabilities.

"This transaction would bring a highly complementary set of capabilities to Seagate, significantly expand our consumer product offerings, add a premium-branded direct-attached storage line, strengthen our network-attached storage business line and enhance our capabilities in software development," said Steve Luczo, Seagate chairman, president and CEO.

If the deal is approved, Spruch would join Seagate and be in charge of the company's consumer storage products organization. Luczo said Seagate is excited to have Spruch, who he called "a true visionary and leader," to join their business.

"With the proliferation of devices and content being shared and stored today, consumer demand for high-quality branded storage solutions continues to grow," Spruch said. "We are excited about the potential for this combination to benefit customers and employees by creating significant scale and opening up new markets. We look forward to making the resources of a much larger company available to our customers around the world."

LaCie has been a major supporter of Apple's Mac platform over the years, and last June was one of the first companies to unveil a Thunderbolt-based external solid-state drive. Apple launched the high-speed Thunderbolt port on its Mac lineup last year.

Last September, LaCie began shipping the first Thunderbolt hard drives priced under $1,000. The Little Big Disk can be purchased through Apple's online store, and starts at $399.95 for 1-terabyte.