Hexagon to Buy Geomagic from 3D Systems for $123 Million
Hexagon has announced that it will be buying the Geomagic assets, including IP, from 3D Systems for $123 million. The deal is expected to close early in the 2nd quarter of 2025.
Geomagic, long with a reputation for having the best modelers for point data, is adept at creating meshes, surfaces and even history-based solid models, from laser scans. The Geomagic group may have finally found a good home after living under the 3D Systems stairs for over a decade.
Hexagon, one of the leading manufacturers of laser scanners, maker of many point clouds, will now own what is regarded as the gold standard of mesh modeling software. Hexagon also has an active manufacturing division and makes metrology equipment, and 3D inspection and metrology are other Geomagic superpowers.
3D Systems acquired Geomagic amidst a flurry of software acquisitions meant to create a software portfolio, a 3D Systems that lived up to its name, but after refocusing on its 3D printing business, its main use of Geomagic was to repair STL models, those used for 3D printing.
Geomagic’s most prominent product lines are:
- Geomagic Design X for reverse engineering software, transforming 3D scan data into CAD models
- Geomagic Control X for 3D inspection and metrology software used for quality control. It also uses scanned data.
- Geomagic Wrap for converting 3D scan data into 3D models. It is popular for creating surfaces and watertight 3D meshes.
- Geomagic Freeform, a digital sculpting and design software used in healthcare, product design and automotive, with haptic feedback that mimics the feel of clay model sculpting.
- Geomagic for SOLIDWORKS: A SOLIDWORKS plug-in that lets SOLIDWORKS users scan directly or import 3D scan data into SOLIDWORKS.
Geomagic has about a hundred dedicated employees who made around $30 million in revenue in 2023. Profitability was not disclosed, but an order of magnitude estimate of employee wages ($100k/employee), an equal amount for R&D plus overhead), leaves about $10 million of annual profit.
Hexagon paid about 4 times the revenue, which is not bad considering recent deals. Siemens is acquiring Altair for a whopping 14 times revenue.
“As a former Geomagic employee, I am of two minds about this news. On the one hand, I’m sad to see what’s happening, but on the other hand, I’m hopeful that Hexagon will protect the amazing IP in this software portfolio,” says Rachael Dalton-Taggart in a LinkedIn post.
The valuation of Geomagic has gone up substantially (2.2X) since 2013, when it was acquired by 3D Systems for $55 million from founder Ping Fu, which at the time was 3.2 times revenue.
