OMEGA Engineering is an American

instrumentation Instrumentation a collective term for measuring instruments that are used for indicating, measuring and recording physical quantities. The term has its origins in the art and science of scientific instrument-making. Instrumentation can refer to ...

company headquartered in

Norwalk, Connecticut , image_map = Fairfield County Connecticut incorporated and unincorporated areas Norwalk highlighted.svg , mapsize = 230px , map_caption = Location in Fairfield County and Connecticut , coordinates ...

, with its main factory in

Bridgeport, New Jersey Bridgeport is a census-designated place{ (CDP) and unincorporated community that is part of Logan Township, in Gloucester County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. At the 2020 United States census, the population of the CDP was 389. in the 2 ...

. It has sales offices in the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, China, Brazil, Singapore, Korea, Japan, and Mexico. Local websites are also available for customers in France, Spain, Italy, Denmark, Netherlands, Australia, India, and Chile. OMEGA does business with the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedi ...

and other industrial corporations. OMEGA has been owned by

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English ...

-owned conglomerate

Spectris plc Spectris plc is a supplier of precision instrumentation and controls. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. History The Company was founded by Richard Fairey in 1915, as the ''Fairey Aviation Comp ...

. since 2011.

History

The company was founded in 1962 by Betty Hollander at her kitchen table while she was raising 4 children.Betty Ruth Hollander (obituary)
Apr. 9, 2011, Stamford Advocate OMEGA began as a

thermocouple A thermocouple, also known as a "thermoelectrical thermometer", is an electrical device consisting of two dissimilar electrical conductors forming an electrical junction. A thermocouple produces a temperature-dependent voltage as a result of th ...

manufacturer but slowly transitioned to other types of instrumentation. Today, OMEGA manufactures and sells devices that measure everything from temperature to pH.

Hacking

In 1996, Tim Lloyd, an 11-year employee of OMEGA and a network administrator within the company, was fired. Three weeks after he was fired, he unleashed a hacking "time bomb" within OMEGA's computer systems, deleting the software that ran all of OMEGA's manufacturing operations at its factory in

. OMEGA spent nearly $2 million repairing the programs and lost nearly $10 million in revenue, resulting in 80 employee layoffs, though Lloyd's lawyer stated that OMEGA's losses were far smaller. Tim Lloyd was convicted of computer sabotage and was sentenced to 41 months in Federal prison. The Tim Lloyd hacking case is considered one of the largest employee sabotage cases in United States business history. The case also aired in a ''

Forensic Files ''Forensic Files'', originally known as ''Medical Detectives'', is an American documentary television program that reveals how forensic science is used to solve violent crimes, mysterious accidents, and outbreaks of illness. The show was origi ...

'' episode "Hack Attack", episode 39 of

season 8 A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...

Sale to Spectris

In April 2011, Betty Hollander died, and the company was turned over to her husband Milton Hollander. Later that year, Milton Hollander sold OMEGA Engineering to British-based

for $475 million. Then, in March 2017, Spectris was forced to recognize an

impairment charge An impaired asset is an asset which has a market value less than the value listed on its owner's balance sheet. According to U.S. accounting rules (known as US GAAP), the value of an asset is impaired when the sum of estimated future cash flows ...

of £115 million with relation to the past acquisition. This charge decreased goodwill and other

intangible asset An intangible asset is an asset that lacks physical substance. Examples are patents, copyright, franchises, goodwill, trademarks, and trade names, as well as software. This is in contrast to physical assets (machinery, buildings, etc.) and finan ...

s on Spectris'

balance sheet In financial accounting, a balance sheet (also known as statement of financial position or statement of financial condition) is a summary of the financial balances of an individual or organization, whether it be a sole proprietorship, a busine ...

. The charge also decreased its 2016 net income.

Sale to Arcline

On April 19, 2022, Spectris announced the sale of Omega Engineering to Arcline Investment Management for $525 million. This was more than $100 million above the Net Book Value subsequent to the goodwill writeoff that Spectris previously took. Spectris announced a $390 million stock buyback as a result of the sale.

References

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External links

* http://www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/002409.txt US v Lloyd, 3rd Circuit, appeal overturning new trial order and reinstating trial verdict. 1962 establishments in Connecticut Cybercrime Sabotage American companies established in 1962 Manufacturing companies established in 1962 Manufacturing companies based in Connecticut