Investors Buy Checkpoint Systems’ Access Control Division, Rename It ‘Sielox’
A company that has been looking into a new business opportunity since selling off its Internet music download business has found harmony in the security industry by purchasing Checkpoint Systems’ access control division. L Q Corp., formerly known as Liquid Audio, has purchased the access control portion of Checkpoint for undisclosed terms and is renaming it Sielox LLC.
Checkpoint will continue to manufacture its RFID and tagging products, as well as its CCTV and burglar/fire alarm offerings.
Sielox will retain key technical, sales, engineering and marketing personnel from Checkpoint Systems’ Access Control Products group and will continue to manufacture the Pinnacle™ access control software. L Q President and CEO William Fox — who served as senior executive vice president of cosmetics-maker Revlon before helping found L Q — said in a statement the former Checkpoint Systems will form the foundation of his company’s aggressive entry into the electronic security industry.
“We felt it was an opportunity where we could add value as well as the fact of security being so much on the minds of Americans,” Fox told SSI. “Security was an opportunity we found was appropriate and opportunistic.”
L Q was formed in 1996 to offer the Liquid Audio music download software. LQ has been without a revenue-generating business since it sold off its Liquid Audio business in January 2003. Fox joined L Q shortly after and says that after taking some time to settle its Liquid Audio obligations, it started investigating opportunities in early 2005. Fox found Checkpoint’s access control products to be a great foundation for L Q’s entry into electronic security.
“The thing about this division is it has a terrific software platform. It’s easy to operate from the user perspective and very scalable,” says Fox, who adds he wants to expand Sielox’s consumer base beyond its traditional retail clientele. “An access control company needs to have a customer base much broader that retail. The more typical application will be office buildings, pharmaceutical, government, hospitals, universities and dormitories.”
Sielox — which along with Pinnacle also manufacturers and markets proximity cards and devices, readers, and 32-bit controllers — will remain at Checkpoint’s Thorofare, N.J., headquarters, though the company plans to later move to a new base of operations. Checkpoint’s national sales manager, Karen Evans, has been named to lead Sielox as president and general manager. Fox says that while the former Checkpoint property will form the core of L Q’s security offerings, the firm plans to grow through further acquisitions.
The Sielox name isn’t that unfamiliar for Checkpoint Systems’ employees. Checkpoint acquired in 1986 a Sunnyvale, Calif.-based access control company called Sielox Systems Inc., established in the late 1970s. Checkpoint Vice President of Hardware Engineering Mark Issacson, who will retain his position in the new company, is the lone employee remaining from the original Sielox.
“Sielox is part of the heritage of this company. The Sielox name is a name our dealer network recognizes,” Fox says. “It’s a name of quality.”
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