Synthesizer Maker Moog Music Sells to Its Employees

On Tuesday (June 9), Moog Music -- the Asheville, N.C.-based manufacturer of a trademark line of modular synthesizers and other electronic instruments -- revealed it would be making a change in ownership. President and CEO Mike Adams announced that half of the company would be sold to its employees.

“The good news is I sold it to all of you,” Adams said on Tuesday (via The New York Times). The CEO will retain 51 percent of the company while employees will take on the remaining 49 percent. Adams has established a trust that will lend the company money to buy out his share over the course of the next six years. In the interim, he will stay on in his role as president and CEO.

Moog was founded in 1953 by Robert Moog, who died 10 years ago of a brain tumor. His widow, Ileana Grams-Moog, said her late husband had intentions of selling a controlling share of the company to its employees prior to his death in 2005. “Bob would be thrilled that Mike Adams realized this shared dream 14 years later,” she said.

According to Moog, the employee stock ownership plan -- which Adams described as the “ultimate pension plan” -- could leave company retirees with a projected $100,000.

“I’ve been looking for a way to get out,” Adams said. “This is my exit strategy.”