Digi has acquired Particle Industries, a provider of edge-to-cloud application infrastructure for intelligent devices, for $50m.

Through its subscription model, California-based Particle helps companies deliver customer value with easy-to-deploy intelligent connected products at scale. The acquisition not only transforms the capabilities of Digi’s OEM product offerings, it also enhances the recurring revenue profile of Digi’s IoT products and services.

“This acquisition positions us to lead the shift towards intelligent, connected product platforms and accelerates annual recurring revenue growth for Digi,” said Ron Konezny, CEO of Digi. “By combining Particle and Digi, we now deliver embedded-as-a-service for customers at scale. Together we remove the complexity businesses encounter when embedding connectivity and intelligence for actionable operational insights to drive better business outcomes and efficiencies from edge to cloud.”

Zach Supalla, CEO of Particle, added: “Joining Digi accelerates our mission to make IoT accessible and scalable for businesses of all sizes. Our customers gain the dependability and global scale Digi has been delivering for more than 40 years combined with the innovation, ease-of-use and developer friendliness that has been Particle’s mainstay for the last decade. It’s a great match, and together we’re set up to accelerate growth and build the next generation of smart, connected products together with our customers.”

Particle’s offering seamlessly integrates hardware, universal connectivity across a range of different protocols, application development tools, edge compute, over-the-air software, and AI and machine learning (ML) model deployment as well as integration with existing cloud platforms, application software and business intelligence systems. Developers write a single line of code to send data across any network, including cellular connectivity that automatically selects the best carrier across 350 global cellular networks without requiring users to manage contracts or SIMs separately. Since its initial launch in 2014, more than 250,000 developers have used Particle to design, develop and deploy intelligent devices.

The purchase price of the acquisition was $50m and was paid in cash net of Particle’s cash and debt and is otherwise subject to customary adjustments. Digi funded the purchase price with its current credit facility. Moelis & Company served as the exclusive financial advisor to Particle on the transaction.

Minnesota-based Digi (www.digi.com) is a provider of IoT connectivity products and services. It helps companies create connected products and deploy and manage critical communications infrastructures in demanding environments with high levels of security and reliability. Founded in 1985, Digi has helped customers connect more than 100 million things and counting.

Particle (www.particle.io) offers application infrastructure for intelligent devices, helping thousands of companies bring intelligence to the edge. Particle provides everything needed to deploy software and models to an edge AI, edge computing or IoT product in one tightly-integrated platform.