Font and imaging technology provide Agfa Monotype has been acquired by TA Associates, both companies announced on Friday. The deal gives TA Associates a majority interest in the company, which was part of Agfa Corp., a subsidiary of the Belgian Agfa-Gevaert Group. The company, whose employees retain minority interest in the privately held firm, has also been renamed Monotype Imaging Inc.
In a statement, Agfa president and CEO Robert M. Givens said: “Although we’ve been successful as an Agfa subsidiary, we realized that as a software company focused on consumer electronics, office printers and the end-user font market, our core competencies differed from those of Agfa, which has a rich history of providing prepress solutions to the graphic arts industry.” He noted that the senior management team will remain in place.
Monotype Imaging’s product line includes embedded font and imaging solutions for hardware developers — such as Universal Font Scaling Technology (UFST), MicroType compression technology and Granite print drivers — as well as customized color management and screening solutions for desktops and the Monotype typeface font libraries. The company’s most well known typeface families include Arial, Times New Roman and Gill Sans.