American Alarm acquires Atlas Alarm

ARLINGTON, Mass.—American Alarm and Communications, a regional full-service security provider based here, yesterday announced that it acquired 3,000 accounts from Atlas Alarm Corp., a fire alarm and life-safety systems provider based in Weymouth, Mass.

“One of the things that is a really good fit is [the deal] strengthens the company's fire alarm capability,” Wells Sampson, American Alarm's president, told Security Systems News.

The acquisition was finalized in late November 2016, Sampson said; financial terms of the deal were not released. Following the purchase, American Alarm and Communication has 28,000 accounts.

Will American Alarm also break the 30,000-account milestone in 2017? Sampson said it's “definitely likely.”

American Alarm will maintain the Atlas Alarm office in Weymouth as its sixth location, alongside offices in Arlington, Auburn and Randolph, Mass., Warwick, R.I., and Manchester, N.H. “Other than the Arlington headquarters, it'll be our largest branch,” Sampson noted.

The office will be brought online with the software connecting each of American's other branches, which will help in locating the closest technician for a job, Sampson explained. “There'll just be a lot of resource sharing that will be possible. So, the new operating software is key.” American will also expand Atlas' product line, incorporating technologies that American Alarm is offering elsewhere into office.

“[The acquisition] rounds out the location of all of our technicians. So, now we really have technicians all across Eastern Mass.,” Sampson said. The location also opens the company up to a wider applicant pool south of Boston.

Over time the company will remodel and rebrand the building, trucks and uniforms, but “The Atlas brand is a good brand. … So, we're not in any rush to eliminate it,” Sampson said.

American Alarm is bringing on many of Atlas' 53 employees. “We brought everyone onboard who wanted to come onboard, and there were some people that were ready to retire,” he said. This brings American's employee total to about 260.

Atlas has some best practices that will be beneficial to American Alarm, Sampson said, such as with customer service and quick fire alarm response. “The admin team at Atlas really painstakingly reviews individual accounts very regularly,” he added. “The attentiveness and the responsiveness and personal touch … are all very strong suits.”