Butterfly, acquired by Texas Instruments International for $50 million in January, has formally started operating as Texas Instruments Israel. The company will serve as the development center for Texas Instruments International, which produces electronic components.
Texas Instruments Israel will lead in chip development in accordance with the Blue Tooth protocol, which is soon to be proclaimed a binding international standard for short-range wireless communications. The company is currently developing new-generation solutions for short-range wireless communications protocols.
Texas Instruments Israel is busy recruiting dozens of engineers. The recruitment process will continue until the year 2000. The new engineers will join the company’s 60-strong staff in Kfar Saba.
Butterfly, which was founded by Amit Heller in 1992, was bought by Texas Instruments International because of the unique technology it had developed in the area of short-range wireless communications. The acquisition was a strategic move on the part of Texas Instruments International, which seeks to be the technological leader in the emerging global market of short-range wireless communications.
According to Heller, who currently serves as director of development and business of Texas Instruments International’s business unit for short-range wireless communications, Butterfly’s transformation into a development branch of the concern means that, in the future, technology will be incorporated into "nearly every cellular instrument, mobile computer, and dozens of other communications applications in use at the home or in the small office throughout the world."
Published by Israel's Business Arena May 26, 1999