Tollgrade Shareholders Approve Merger with Affiliates of Golden Gate Capital

By Sujata Garud
TMCnet Contributor

Shareholders of Tollgrade Communications (News - Alert), Inc. have approved the definitive merger agreement with affiliates of Golden Gate Capital at a special meeting held on May 5, 2011.

As per the terms of the deal, each shareholder of Tollgrade will receive $10.10 in cash per share after closure of the transaction contemplated by the merger agreement. Pending satisfaction of other customary closing conditions, the transaction is expected to close in the next week, at which time Tollgrade's common stock will cease trading.

Tollgrade Communications, Inc. is a leading provider of network assurance solutions for the telecommunications and utilities industries. Tollgrade's telecommunication products and solutions enable communication service providers to efficiently manage their access networks in an age of increased competition, continually evolving technology, and ongoing pressure to reduce costs while its real-time Smart Grid Monitoring solutions allow utility customers to continuously detect key circuit parameters, and communicate mission critical data wirelessly to a central location to provide Continuous Grid Intelligence.

Tollgrade Communications was in news recently when it announced its plan to demonstrate its latest service assurance offerings at the Supercomm 2009 telecom trade event this week in Chicago. These offerings are the result of an agreement with Finland-based Accanto Systems (News - Alert), which supplies advanced customer service assurance and troubleshooting solutions to communication service providers.

Tollgrade said it plans to display its quad-play service assurance solutions at the trade event in addition to showcasing Accanto’s line of intelligent customer service assurance products. Tollgrade’s next-generation service assurance portfolio and its Stratum test and diagnostics solution will also be displayed at the event.

The OEM agreement between Tollgrade and Accanto enables the full spectrum of service assurance solutions for video, voice, data and wireless applications. The suite of products include advanced multi-protocol analyzers and network monitoring systems which support mobile and VoIP applications. The products will be marketed under the Tollgrade brand, said company sources.

Sujata Garud is a TMCnet freelancer with three years of writing/editing experience and two years of market research experience. As an editor she has covered the IT, electronics, banking, pharma, construction, mining and healthcare industries. To see more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Rich Steeves