Garmin to buy Raymarine, really?

Flash

This morning the Sunday Telegraph is reporting (link dicey, here’s alternate) that Garmin is the mystery bidder known to have approached Raymarine in late February.  I’m fairly surprised, but what do I know!  It seems to me that Garmin is competing well against Raymarine, at least on the lower side of the market (while Furuno comes on strong, particularly on the high side and if it can get product out the door). But it’s also obvious that Garmin is making a big play for the dealer/installer and boat builder business that it’s never done well with, but where Raymarine excels. On the other hand, don’t the Garmin and Raymarine product lines overlap a great deal? Or am I seeing the trees, not the forest?  And what would this buyout mean for us consumers; might Garmin eventually dominate marine electronics to a detrimental degree?
  But note that even if this report—based on “sources close to the deal”—is true, it is not a done deal, and the Telegraph adds that “A number of private equity companies are also thought to be eyeing Raymarine.”  Ray has its annual meeting this coming Friday, and maybe we’ll all know more after that. Your thoughts?



Ben Ellison

Ben Ellison

Panbo editor, publisher & chief bottlewasher from 4/2005 until 8/2018, and now pleased to have Ben Stein as a very able publisher, webmaster, and editing colleague. Please don't regard him as an "expert"; he's getting quite old and thinks that "fadiddling fumble-putz" is a more accurate description.

4 Responses

  1. Eugenio says:

    Actually the two lines of products overlap. Quite a lot. I think you got the point about Garmin trying to leverage Raymarine dominance of the indirect/dealer/shipbuilder market.
    What makes less sense is…what Garmin is going to do with that part of product that does not overlap, and competes directly with, for example, B&G in the sailing yacht market.
    Will they keep it? Will they sell it?
    I see fewer and fewer installation of Raymarine products…(here in Italy, at least), even if the still keep a good slice in the mid-range motoryacht market.

  2. Dan (b393capt) says:

    Is this a one time treat … or has Panbo gone to 7 days a week ?

  3. Sandy says:

    Garmarine, or Raymin? Lets hope there will be a LOT of cross pollenation in Tech Support and Customer Service!

  4. Steve says:

    I hope not. The customer support at _both_ Raymarine and Garimin is awful! They will probably just outsource it all to India .

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