Universal Scientific Industrial (USI), a design and manufacturing company from Taiwan, said it would acquire assets of troubled mainboard maker Abit Computer Corp. The latter confirmed the move, but preferred to call it “strategic” agreement. Under the terms of the agreement, USI will continue to manufacture mainboards under Abit’s brand-name and no change in the development process expected.

“With USI’s manufacturing excellence and economies of scale, coupled with Abit engineering and innovation, we are confident that our combined resources will produce our most exciting Abit products ever,” said Jason Hsu, executive vice president at Abit.

Under the terms of the agreement, USI will pay a total of about $10.9 million (350 million Taiwanese dollars) in cash and 20 million preferred shares of USI’s newly established subsidiary for Abit’s motherboard brand “ABIT”, as well as all patents, products, business and human resources related to its motherboard business, according to USI’s release cited by DigiTimes web-site.

As a result of the transaction, end-users will still be able to buy Abit-branded mainboards developed by the engineers renowned for their passion for high-performance computer equipment. Earlier Abit made its mainboards itself and those products were recognized as among the best of the best by enthusiasts. However, after going into tax dispute with the Taiwan authorities, the company had to consider outsourcing and even sell off its building to cut debts.

“Motherboards are one of USI’s main product lines and we are confident that the acquisition provides an opportunity for USI to benefit from Abit’s outstanding brand image and well-developed channels in Asian, American and European markets in order to expand USI’s share in the motherboard market and become one of the tier one motherboard suppliers in the world,” said CY Wei, president of USI.