# 7: Dyantech Corp.

PAST GLOBE 100 RANKING 1997: 20 1996: 100 1995: - 1994: - 1993: 86 1992: 95 1991: 45 1990: 87 1989: 45

n increasing demand for its communications-testing and airline products drove Dynatech into this year's top 10 of the Globe 100 for the first time.

Revenues were up about 36 percent in 1997, to $457 million, for the Burlington manufacturer.

The rapid deployment of new technologies and the deregulation of the telecommunications industry are driving increased demand for Dynatech's testing products, which help regional phone companies and others monitor their communications systems. Those products accounted for about 60 percent of Dynatech's sales in 1997.

Sales of the company's visual communications equipment increased by about 9 percent in 1997, as more airlines purchased its real-time flight information passenger video displays for their in-flight entertainment systems. Through subsidiary Itronix Corp., acquired in December 1996, the company also is a leading supplier of lightweight, networked computing and communications devices.

But Dynatech's excursion into the top 10 will be short-lived. By this time next year, the company will have been taken private by about 300 key employees and the New York buyout firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice. The deal, valued at about $900 million, will result in CD&R owning 70 percent of the company, the employees 25 percent, and current shareholders 5 percent.

Company officials said the restructuring of ownership was launched because, despite strong sales and profits in recent years, Dynatech's stock performance did not meet expectations. The company began looking like a takeover target.

''I was looking for a way to get out of that, and for us to run the business for the long term,'' said John Reno, Dynatech's chairman, president, and chief executive.