Michigan-based tech firm acquires local internet-of-things company

Indianapolis-based tech company Dattus Inc. has been acquired by Troy, Michigan-based Plex Systems.

The deal, announced Tuesday, was finalized earlier this month. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Dattus provides internet-of-things solutions to manufacturers, helping them streamline operations through data collection, aggregation, visualization and analytics. 

The company, which has its roots in the Purdue Foundry entrepreneurship hub in West Lafayette, has 14 employees—seven in Indianapolis and seven in India.

Nine of those employees will remain with Plex, but only two of them will remain in Indianapolis. Plex Systems has seven employees in Indiana after the acquisition.

Dattus co-founder and CEO Anurag Garg, who was based in Indianapolis, will remain with Plex Systems as vice president, analytics and IoT.

“Plex is an ideal fit for Dattus, as we share the same central vision of transforming manufacturing in the cloud,” Garg said in a written statement. “I’m confident that our work in machine connectivity, data management and analytics will be a major force in that transformation going forward, and I couldn’t be happier to join Plex.”

Garg co-founded Dattus in December 2012 with fellow Purdue graduate student Lokesh Gupta, who headed up operations in India. Gupta also will go to work for Plex.

Dattus moved to Indianapolis in 2015 and outlined plans to grow to 37 employees by 2020.

In 2016, Dattus won a Mira Award—considered the state’s top technology awards program—for Best New Tech Product.

Mira Award judges said: “Dattus is an extremely innovative and disruptive product, which actually includes a suite of both hardware and software products, that have the potential to revolutionize manufacturing and energy production.”

Plex Systems, which has about 500 employees, is in the midst of a growth spurt.

Though the company does not disclose financial figures, it reported a record year in 2017. More than 600 manufacturers run the company’s platform at 2,000 facilities—up from 1,600 a year ago.

Plex announced several new products in 2017 and added 100 employees.

“Plex pioneered the connection of machines and sensors to the cloud, ushering in the industrial internet of things,” Richard Murray, chief product officer for Plex Systems, said in a written statement. “Dattus represents the next generation in IIoT, and accelerates our mission to make machine connectivity as simple as adding a smart thermostat to your home. We see this as an opportunity for a major step forward in both connectivity and utilization of machine data to drive efficiency, performance, and innovation on the shop floor.”