MILESTONES
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Marko
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Medical Ventures Corp. (Richmond, BC, Canada), a medical devices company specializing in vascular and surgical products, has signed an agreement to acquire two vascular product development companies, B-Balloon Ltd. and Neovasc Medical Ltd. Both companies were incubated by Peregrine Ventures (Or Yehuda, Israel) and are focused on developing new technologies for the interventional treatment of heart and vascular diseases. Concurrent with completing the transactions, Alexei Marko, currently Medical Ventures' president and chief operating officer, will assume the role of president and CEO. "Acquiring Neovasc and B-Balloon will bring several new vascular therapies into Medical Ventures' product pipeline and will provide us with attractive short- and long-term revenue opportunities," said Marko.
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Balthrop
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Biological testing technology developer Luminex Corp. (Austin, TX) and Tyson Foods Inc. (Springdale, AR) have reached a collaboration agreement to create food safety and animal health tests. Luminex has historically focused on the development of assays for the human health, pharmaceutical, and biomedical research fields; however, company officials believe their processes and technologies could benefit the food safety and animal health industries both domestically and internationally. Tyson and Luminex's first collaboration is the development of an avian flock health monitoring panel. "Luminex is pleased to partner with Tyson to develop novel tests that we believe will allow the food industry to screen for pathogens and other microbes more efficiently and accurately," said Patrick J. Balthrop, president and chief executive officer of Luminex. "Our xMAP technology, which enables multiple tests to be run simultaneously on one sample, has great application in the food safety and animal health arena, as it provides a significant level of data quickly and efficiently."
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Niland
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Vapotherm Inc. (Stevensville, MD), a privately held manufacturer of respiratory care devices, has been granted patent protection through 2022 for an apparatus used in its delivery tube technology for respiratory tract therapy. "Our patient delivery circuit design is unique in the field and provides Vapotherm a competitive advantage through the delivery of optimally conditioned breathing gases all the way to the patient, whereas conventional approaches can result in significant temperature and humidity loss," said William Niland, chairman and chief business development officer at Vapotherm.
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Power
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Drug-delivery technology manufacturer Aerogen Ltd. (Galway, Ireland) has completed a management buyout from its U.S. parent, Nektar Therapeutics (San Carlos, CA), for an undisclosed amount. Under the terms of the deal, Nektar will maintain a minority share in Aerogen, which specializes in products for the respiratory sector. "This deal empowers Aerogen to grow our business and expand our product offerings," said John Power, CEO of Aerogen. The company reports that it plans to announce new partnerships with a number of U.S. and European market leaders in both the medical field and commercial products area in the near future.
Dental implant manufacturer Lifecore Biomedical Inc. (Chaska, MN) has agreed to be acquired by affiliates of private equity firm Warburg Pincus (New York City) for about $239 million. "As a private company, Lifecore will have greater flexibility to focus on its long-term strategic direction," said Dennis J. Allingham, president and CEO of Lifecore Biomedical.
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Rusckowski
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Royal Philips Electronics (Amsterdam) plans to acquire clinical IT and service provider Visicu Inc. (Baltimore) for approximately $430 million. Philips plans to integrate Visicu's remote patient monitoring and clinical decision support technology with its patient monitors. "[The] deal builds on Philips' announcement two weeks ago that we're acquiring another clinical IT company, Emergin," said Steve Rusckowski, CEO of Philips Healthcare. "By investing in clinical IT solutions like those offered by Visicu and Emergin, we believe we can offer customers more attractive patient monitoring solutions that improve hospital productivity as well as patient outcomes. So making these investments we believe will drive further growth in our patient monitoring business."
