Diagnostic Deals: A Roundup of the Key Mergers, Acquisitions, Alliances, Licenses and Other Strategic Transactions From the Past Month

After last month’s flurry of transactions, business calmed down as it often does during the start of summer. Here are the key deals and trends from mid-June through the third week of July.

M&A
The year’s biggest deal in the lab M&A space, Roche’s $2.4 billion acquisition of the 43% of Foundation Medicine that it does not currently own, progressed toward its scheduled 2018 closing with the launch of a tender offer for Foundation at $137 per share, a premium of 29% over its June 18 market valuation. Once the tender offer closes on July 30, Roche will acquire the remaining shares via merger. Acquiring the molecular analysis and genomic profiling assets of its erstwhile collaborator, which will remain autonomous after the merger, has become a major part of Roche’s strategy for bolstering its position in personalized healthcare.

Agilent Technologies continued its shopping spree by inking a deal to acquire privately-held glycan reagents producer ProZyme for an undisclosed price. This is the one-time Hewlett-Packard spinoff’s fourth M&A deal of the year following the completion of its $250 million purchase of Advanced Analytical Technologies and announced agreements to acquire Korean scientific instruments distributor Young In Scientific and chemical standards provider Ultra Scientific for undisclosed amounts.

Another big deal was Thermo Fisher Scientific’s June 25 announcement of its deal to buy Roper subsidiary Gatan for $925 million in cash. The electron microscope software manufacturer with 320 employees and roughly $150 million in annual revenues will become part of Thermo Fisher’s analytical instruments unit once the deal closes by year’s end.

Strategic Alliances
Strategic collaboration was noticeably slow, in terms of both volume and impact with collaborations between diagnostics firms and academic institutions and nonprofits furnishing most of the impetus. Of course, there were a few deals pairing heavy hitters from the private sector, including the collaboration of

• Illumina and PerkinElmer to codevelop metagenomic sequencing workflow enabling DNA extraction and sequencing from samples without the need to culture the bacteria
• Illumina and OrigiMed to develop new molecular oncology assays; and
• Bio-Rad and Bruker to comarket workflow solutions for pathogen detection and confirmation.

The other salient trend during the period was the trio of strategic alliances targeting the China market with Predicine, Agena Bioscience and Berlin, Germany-based CeGaT teaming with local partners to provide diagnostics services to the vast Chinese market.

The headliner on the consumer genetics front was Nutrisystem’s partnering with Akesogen and Genetic Direction to launch DNA Body Blueprint, a genetic analysis test in which DNA from cheek swabs is used to generate personalized information on an individual customer’s nutrition, metabolism and eating behaviors for use in tailoring individualized weight loss plans.

Here’s a summary of all the key diagnostic deals from mid-May through the third week in June: