January 20, 2011 — Brush Engineered Materials Inc. (NYSE:BW) will change its name to Materion Corporation (NYSE:MTRN) and unify all of its businesses under the new name effective March 8, 2011. The Company’s common stock will continue to trade on the New York Stock Exchange. Concurrent with the March 8 name change, the Company also will unveil a new company website and company-wide brand identity.
Brush Engineered Materials began in the metals, mining and specialty metals businesses, but has evolved into other areas like thin-film solar and microelectronics packaging materials, said Richard J. Hipple, chairman, president and CEO. He added that "heritage" businesses are very successful and integral to the company’s future, part of a much larger portfolio. "Through changes, acquisitions and other internal initiatives, we have expanded into a brand new 80-year-old company at the forefront of technologies essential to our customers. We are a leading global producer of advanced materials and services providing enabling technology solutions for customers in the fastest-growing segments of long-term global growth markets, including consumer electronics, telecom infrastructure, defense and science, industrial and commercial aerospace, energy and medical."
"As we have grown, our businesses continued to operate under original names and brand identities. That has made it difficult to position the Company as a single, unified organization. We find that even some long-time customers are not aware of the full scope of our capabilities."
Hipple added, "We are often competing against large global players that enjoy strong brand recognition. With annual sales of more than $1.2 billion and growing at a compounded annual growth rate of 17% since 2002, we have the resources and critical mass to participate successfully at that level. We expect to benefit from the recognition that comes from one name and a single strong brand."
In its transformation, Hipple noted that the Company has also become leaner, faster-growing, more diversified, and less cyclical. "We have a higher-value business model today in terms of our growth potential, margins, cash flow, balance sheet and capital structure. We believe the new name will better reflect the new Company."
The unification of all of the Company’s businesses under the Materion name is intended to create efficiencies and facilitate synergies. The new name, along with a new business unit alignment under the Materion brand, is expected to provide customers with better access and recognition to a broader scope of products, technology and value-added services.
Brush Engineered Materials Inc., through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, supplies highly engineered advanced enabling materials to global markets. Products include precious and non-precious specialty metals, inorganic chemicals and powders, specialty coatings, specialty engineered beryllium alloys, beryllium and beryllium composites, and engineered clad and plated metal systems. http://www.beminc.com/ Subsidiaries: Brush Wellman Inc.; Williams Advanced Materials Inc.; Technical Materials, Inc.; Zentrix Technologies Inc.; Brush Ceramic Products Inc.; Beryllium Products
Williams Advanced Materials supplies specialty materials used in thin film deposition and semiconductor packaging applications. Learn more about Williams Advanced Materials (WAM) at http://www.williams-adv.com/
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