NGK Spark Plug is to affiliate by acquisition of total shares, Caire of the American Chart Group, Chart BioMedical of UK and Chart BioMedical (Chengdu) of China. A total acquisition amount will be US$133 million (equivalent to about JPY15 billion). The shares will be transferred in December 2018.

　Caire established in 1992 is engaged in the business of oxygen concentrator and the LO2 system for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) as a company of the biomedical segment in the Chart Group. The former is well known also as ECLIPSE or Free Style and the latter as HELIOS in Japan. The annual sales ending December 2017 amounted to US$145 million (equivalent to JPY16.5 billion) with 416 employees as of August 2018.
On the other hand, NGK’s medical business has a scale of JPY2 billion, half of which seems to be COPD-related (as we estimate). The acquisition at this time will surely give a great impact to the corporate business activities.

NGK Spark Plug has been promoting the enhancement and globalization of its medical business since long before. In April 2016 it made a capital tie-up with business partnership with Japan MDM which is a medical equipment manufacturer of artificial joints or bones. Also in November 2017 it started to launch in Europe the exhalation NO scale for hospitals loaded with NGK’s sensor unit.

Chart, on the other hand, also acquired VRV of Italian cryogenic equipment manufacturer which produces cryogenic storage tanks, etc. on September 27. It seems that the Chart side is proceeding with selection and integration of business.
As seen in the simultaneous acquisition of Chart BioMedical selling Caire’s products of UK and Chinese Chart BioMedical (Chengdu), NGK plans to build up a global value chain for the oxygen concentrator from development to production/sales In addition to the artificial bone or scale, and also to endeavor to develop a new oxygen concentrating system making the most of the technologies of both companies.
Regarding the distributing system of Caire’s oxygen concentrator and liquid oxygen system, NGK is planning to decide after discussing with Caire.