ACT Networks Seeks Merger With SourceCom

ACT Networks, a Camarillo computer networking company, has made a bid to purchase SourceCom Inc., a Westlake Village high-tech firm that has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

The transaction must clear several contingencies, including approval by U.S. Bankruptcy Court, before it is finalized. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

ACT Networks develops and manufactures frame-relay access products for voice, data and integrated network uses. The company’s products allow users to transmit voice and data information on the same circuit. SourceCom manufactures high-speed access products.

“The [high-speed] market is a very crowded market dominated by some very big players,” said Andre de Fusco, vice president of corporate development for ACT Networks. “SourceCom ran into trouble being on its own. They have an excellent engineering group, but not the financing to compete with those guys.”

If the deal goes through, De Fusco said, ACT Networks would incorporate SourceCom’s technology into its own to expand the company’s market.

“It can give us the ability to deliver platforms to carriers to offer voice and fax services over the Internet,” De Fusco said. “Or the same technology can be used by corporations that can do the same thing over their private networks.”

SourceCom has 104 employees. De Fusco said it was too early to determine how many might be retained should the deal go through. ACT Networks has 265 employees.