Agilent test and measurement employees headed for Keysight

Mark Pierpoint, Ph.D., vice president and general manager of Agilent Technologies' Software and Modular Solutions Division, is one of about 9,500 Agilent employees poised to join Keysight Technologies on August 1. At that date, Keysight will become—as a legal entity—a wholly-owned test-and-measurement subsidiary of Agilent, whose life-sciences business will continue to operate under the Agilent banner. As of November 2014, Keysight will separate from Agilent.

“This announcement is very exciting” said Pierpoint in a telephone conversation shortly after Agilent released the new name. “Everybody is pretty energized at this great starting point.”

Pierpoint acknowledged, “We've already lived through one name change—from HP to Agilent—and certainly I think the feeling here is that Keysight is much more aligned to the business and much more aligned to what the value is that we want to bring to our customers and that we have been bringing to our customers.”

Asked why the name change has been announced now, Pierpoint said, “I think the feeling had been that since many of us had been through this process before, when we created Agilent back in 1999, the company had waited too long to announce the name and give everybody something to align and focus on.”

He continued, “I think the other thing is that it represents there is a lot of hard work that has to be done behind the scenes to rebrand products and so on and so forth, and so having a little bit of extra time, knowing what needs to be done, is always very welcome.”

For the electronic measurement business, the Agilent brand remains in effect until August 1. In the interim, Pierpont said, you may see some transitionary effects, with, for instance, Agilent emphasized on one side of a business card but Keysight mentioned on the other.

Pierpoint said that geographically, Keysight will maintain a presence at Agilent's Santa Clara headquarters, perhaps taking over one of the buildings, although the new company's headquarters will be in Santa Rosa. He noted that the life sciences and test and measurement operations have shared manufacturing operations in Panang, but HP/Agilent has already had to spin off Avago and Verigy (which is now part of Advantest). “We've been through this process before,” Pierpoint said. “We know how to do that, so it's kind of a combination of—there are some clean sites there are some sites that we're going to share going forward, and there are a few very few sites where we are just going to move off and pick up a new location.”

Pierpoint noted that legal issues regarding the name change must be dealt with, but from a customer standpoint, customers should expect to see no change at all in the channels they are already using.

Agilent Labs has been a resource shared by both the electronics measurement group and the life sciences operation. Commenting on this issue, Pierpoint said, “Interestingly enough, about two and a half years ago we actually separated Agilent Labs into two separate entities. The Agilent Labs name was retained by the life-sciences and chemical-analysis side of the house. The other side of it, which was more focused and concerned with the electronic measurement side, was renamed the Measurement Research Labs, and in fact that's been reporting into the electronic measurement business for about two and a half years. So that separation has already taken place inside the company, and obviously there is a lot of sharing that goes on between them, and I would expect that to continue. But our investment in forward-looking research and university grants and so forth—those have been separated out and we're forming new groups within Keysight Technologies that will be able to pick up that work and continue it to go forward.”

The Agilent business that will become Keysight has a FY13 revenues forecast of $2.9 billion and has 9,500 employees. It claims the #1 position in three industry segments: communications (wireless data); aerospace and defense; and industrial, computers, and semiconductors.

Ron Nersesian will become president and CEO of Keysight, which will be headquartered in Santa Rosa, CA.