Hawaii-based PERS dealer acquired

Tunstall Americas on June 9 announced its acquisition of Kupuna Monitoring Systems, a PERS dealer based in Aiea, Hawaii. While the number of accounts and the price of the deal were not released, Allison Frazer, Tunstall Americas' director of marketing, told me it was part of an ongoing company strategy.

Tunstall focuses on supplying and monitoring PERS devices for seniors. As such, Frazer said the company is actively looking to have a larger presence in warmer climates, which tend to have higher concentrations of seniors, Frazer said. “Hawaii alone has over 40,000 seniors who we believe can benefit from our services," she said.

These accounts will be monitored from Tunstall's 87,000 square-foot “Connected Care Center” in Pawtucket, R.I. Kupuna's accounts were previously monitored by Philips.

Frazer said that Kupuna would start offering Tunstall systems, which it hadn't done previously, and will transition all existing Kupuna customers to Tunstall equipment.

"We are proud of the work we have done the past 10 years to support the elder community throughout Hawaii, and very grateful for the trust people have put in KMS,” Cullen Hayashida, president and founder of KMS, said in a prepared statement.

“We believe that our local service delivery and strong relationships with healthcare institutions and government agencies combined with Tunstall's world-class connected care monitoring products and services will create new opportunities to serve Hawaii's kupuna and their families,” Hayashida continued, in the statement.

According to the release, Kupuna is the Hawaiian word for elder.

Tunstall also operates back up facility in Long Island City, N.Y.