Vaisala — BrandWiki

Vaisala

Overview

Vaisala Oyj

type	Julkinen osakeyhtiö
traded as	omx: HEX24388 VAIAS
foundation	1936 Vantaa, Finland (as Mittari)
founder	Vilho Väisälä
location	Vantaa, Finland
area served	150+ countries
key people	Kai Öistämö, CEO
num employees	over 2,300 (2023)
revenue	€540.4 million (2023) ‡R1R‡

Vaisala Oyj is a Finnish company that produces products and services for environmental and industrial measurement.

Their major customer groups and markets are national meteorological and hydrological services, aviation authorities, defense forces, road authorities, the weather critical energy sector, life science and high-technology industries, and building automation.

Vaisala had over 2,400 employees[9] and net sales of €596.9 million in 2025. Vaisala serves customers in more than 150 countries.[10]

The parent company Vaisala Oyj, domicile in Vantaa, Finland, is listed on the NASDAQ OMX Helsinki. Vaisala Group has offices and operations in Finland, the United States, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan,[11] Kenya, Malaysia, México, South Korea, Sweden, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.

History

Vaisala originated in the 1930s when Professor

operating income	€66.6 million (2023) ‡R1R‡

net income	€48.9 million (2023) ‡R1R‡

assets	€442.8 million (2023) ‡R1R‡

equity	€267.9 million (2023) ‡R1R‡

products	Weather and industrial measurement products and services

homepage	www.vaisala.com

subsid	Veriteq Instruments Inc.,‡R2R‡ Sigmet Corp.,‡R3R‡ 3TIER Inc.,‡R4R‡ Second Wind Systems Inc.,‡R5R‡ Vionice,‡R6R‡ Leophere SAS,‡R7R‡ K-Patents‡R8R‡

Commercial production since 1936

After the first sounding, Väisälä continued with further development and tests until a radiosonde could be brought into commercial production. Radiosonde deliveries started with the RS11 (1936–). Amongst its first customers was the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1937, Väisälä's radiosonde won a gold medal at the World Fair in Paris.

Recovering from the wars

World War II, the Finnish Winter War 1939–1940, and the Finnish Continuation War 1941–1944 disrupted many lives and upset business and delivery activities internationally. The post-war decades witnessed a strenuous effort to revive the national and international economies. Vaisala grew to employ 60 people in 1954. The first issue of Vaisala News magazine was published in 1959. Thanks to major product development efforts, during the 1950s and 1960s, the Vaisala Sounding System became completely electronic, the first automatic radiosonde receiver and the world's first fully transistorized radiosonde RS13 (1965–) were introduced, and the first weather satellite image receiver was delivered. Yrjö Toivola took over as the managing director of the company when Professor Vilho Väisälä died in 1969.

Vigorous 1970s and 80s

The 1970s and 1980s were busy decades for Vaisala. Thin-film technology was developed for Vaisala HUMICAP® relative humidity sensors - the first in the world.[14] The Vaisala CORA Automatic Sounding System - along with automatic weather stations, road weather stations and aviation weather systems – was introduced. In 1975, Vaisala employed over 200 people. During the 1980s, numerous new offices were established to ensure the company's ability to serve customers worldwide – in the UK, Japan, USA, Germany, and Australia. A traffic weather company was also acquired in the UK. Vaisala's first cleanroom was built to enable the design and manufacture of semiconductors in-house. Vaisala BAROCAP® barometric pressure sensor technology was introduced, as well as a new radiosonde family - the Vaisala Radiosonde RS80 (1981–2008). These units made use of a water-activated wet battery that had a very long storage life and high power density but a limited working life. The Professor Vilho Väisälä Award was established in cooperation with the WMO, to stimulate interest in meteorological research involving meteorological observation methods and instruments.

The radiosondes have also been used in many upper air ozone research studies using an attached detector that had the sensor data multiplexed with the standard meteorology dataset. GPS positioning information was added to gain more accurate wind speed information.

New millennium

CEO Pekka Ketonen was appointed in 1992. The company was listed on the Helsinki Exchanges in 1994. By then, it employed over 600 people. Further product developments included the introduction of GPS technology for upper air wind measurement, the Vaisala CARBOCAP sensor, and Vaisala DRYCAP sensor technology for industrial dewpoint measurement. New offices were established in France and China, and business acquisitions in aviation weather and surface weather further enhanced Vaisala's presence in the USA.

The new millennium was kicked off with yet more business acquisitions - in wind profiling, lightning detection, and aviation weather. U.S. manufacturing operations were concentrated in Boulder, Colorado. New product launches included a new radiosonde product family - the Vaisala Radiosonde RS92 (2003 - in production), as well as the Vaisala Weather Transmitter, which measures the six most essential weather parameters in one compact instrument. This was much improved from the previous generation device and now included consumer cells[15] to make up the battery due to energy saving techniques.

CEO Ketonen retired on October 1, 2006. Vaisala's board of directors appointed Kjell Forsén the new company CEO. Forsén last served as president of Ericsson Finland before joining Vaisala on September 18, 2006. As of October 2020, Vaisala's President and CEO is Kai Öistämö[16].

Vaisala technology has played a part in space exploration for some 60 years, for instance the

History of acquisitions and divestments

The Vaisala Group strives for global market and product leadership in selected business areas[22] The goal is achieved mainly by organic growth and supplemented by corporate acquisitions.

1980s

1987: the Group acquired Tycho Technologies Inc. of USA, manufacturer of upper air wind profiler.[23]
August 1989: the Group acquired the British Thermal Mapping International Ltd. of the United Kingdom. Thermal Mapping specializes in measuring the thermal characteristics of roads and runways and in providing forecast models.

1990s

June 1995: the Group sold Vaisala Technologies Inc. to Breed Technologies Inc. of USA. Vaisala Technologies Inc. (VTI) manufactured silicon capacitive sensors for the car industry.
July 1996: the Group acquired Artais Weather Check Inc. of USA.
March 1999: the Group acquired AIR Inc. of USA.
October 1999: the Group acquired Handar Inc. of USA.

2000s

February 2000: the Group acquired Dimension SA of France.
October 2000: The Group acquired Jenoptik Impulsphysik GmbH of Germany.
June 2001: the Group acquired the Meteorological Systems Unit of Radian International LLC of USA.
March 2002: the Group acquired Global Atmospherics Inc. of Tucson, Arizona, USA.
July 2005: the Group acquired CLH Inc. of Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.
January 2006: the Group acquired Sigmet Corporation of Westford, Massachusetts, USA.
January 2009: the Group acquired Aviation System Maintenance Inc. (ASMI), Kansas, USA.
December 2009: the Group acquired Quixote Transportation Technologies (QTT), a subsidiary to Quixote Corporation.

2010s

March 2010: the Group acquired Veriteq Instruments Inc. of Vancouver, BC, Canada
August 2013: the Group acquired remote sensing manufacturer Second Wind Systems Inc. of Somerville, Massachusetts.[24]
December 2013: the Group acquired 3TIER, Inc., a renewable energy assessment and forecasting services company, headquartered in Seattle, Washington.[25]
October 2017: Vaisala acquired Vionice, a Finnish IT company specialized in computer vision and artificial intelligence.[6]
October 2018: Vaisala acquired all the shares in Leosphere SAS, a French company specializing in developing, manufacturing and servicing turnkey wind lidar instruments for wind energy, aviation, meteorology, and air quality.[26]

2020s

January 2022: Vaisala acquired Whether or Knot (AerisWeather), a U.S. company providing weather and environmental data services.[29]
November 2024: Vaisala acquired Speedwell Climate, a U.K. company specializing in data and software for weather risk transfer.[30]
December 2024: Vaisala acquired the WeatherDesk business from Maxar Technologies.[31]
September 2025: Vaisala acquired Quanterra, a U.K. company specializing in atmospheric monitoring of CO2 fluxes.[32]

Vaisala

History

Commercial production since 1936

Recovering from the wars

Vigorous 1970s and 80s

New millennium

History of acquisitions and divestments

1980s

1990s

2000s

2010s

2020s

Vaisala business areas

Weather and Environment

Industrial Measurements

Products and services

Measurement Instruments

Measurement Systems

Application and Services

Services and Data Subscription Services

Wind Resource & Energy Assessment Services // Remote Sensing Measurement for Wind Industry

Vaisala Prize

External links

References