Wonder if this had anything to do with the selling. It looks like an interesting deal, actually, and I think I'll listen to the call. Anybody else have thoughts?
>>FREMONT, Calif., June 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Ciphergen Biosystems Inc. (Nasdaq: CIPH - news) announced today that it has reached agreement to acquire the BioSepra, S.A. chromatography business, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Invitrogen Corporation, for $12 million in cash. The transaction is expected to close within 60 days. Concurrently, Invitrogen and Ciphergen announced the signing of a collaboration agreement to jointly develop a family of benchtop biology products that accelerate ``Genome to Proteome'' discovery and development.
Ciphergen believes that a key bottleneck in the emerging field of proteomics involves the rapid purification of proteins from either native biological sources or from ``gene to protein,'' biologically manufactured proteins. For example, scientists are increasingly focusing on ``Genome to Proteome'' strategies to produce proteins, which then must be obtained in large quantities for basic research studies, drug discovery and development. This creates a rapidly growing market for protein purification products extending from benchtop research to large-scale manufacturing.
Ciphergen's ProteinChip® System, through a series of chromatographic surfaces, allows ``on-chip'' optimization and purification of proteins in hours or days versus weeks or months using existing methodologies. This new method of purity analysis is called ProteinChip® Retentate Chromatography -- Mass Spectrometry (RC-MS). In May 2001, Ciphergen received a U.S. Patent (Number 6,225,047) entitled ``Use of Retentate Chromatography to Generate Difference Maps'' which describes the use of RC-MS technology as well as claims its use as a novel differential protein expression profiling method for protein biomarker discovery from biological fluids.
``BioSepra's world recognized protein chromatography products, combined with Ciphergen's ProteinChip System for RC-MS purity analysis, creates a major advance in protein purification and addresses a significant bottleneck in the field of proteomics,'' said Dr. William E. Rich, President and CEO of Ciphergen Biosystems.
``BioSepra's chromatography expertise has not previously been extended outside of the large-scale process chromatography world, but we view their technology and R&D team led by Dr. Egisto Boschetti to be our launching pad for a chromatography-based protein purification business which expands our current proteomics products business. We envision providing proteomics and genomics customers with a variety of purification and analysis products for rapid sample preparation, purification and analysis from 'on-chip' to laboratory to large-scale manufacturing.''
During 2000, the BioSepra business had sales of approximately $5.9 million, entirely derived from the large-scale process chromatography market, which is estimated to currently be a $240 million market. Together, Ciphergen and BioSepra intend to enter the roughly $1 billion laboratory scale bio-separations market and expand the process chromatography business by offering a full line of products including:
Lab scale chromatography columns and media for high speed purification
Disposable pre-fractionation kits for rapid sample preparation
Gene to protein purification kits for tagged and non-tagged proteins
ProteinChip Systems utilizing RC-MS assisted protein purification and
analysis
Expanded line of fluidized-bed process chromatography products
Located 20 miles north of Paris, BioSepra's 43,000 sq. ft. facility is ISO 9001 certified and cGMP compliant. This facility will become a major European marketing and manufacturing center for Ciphergen.
Conference Call and Webcast Information
A conference call with Ciphergen executives will be held on Tuesday, June 26 2001, at 10:00 a.m. EDT to discuss the acquisition. To participate, please phone 888-273-9890. The conference ID is 592860. Participants outside the U.S. and Canada should call 612-332-1213. The call will also be webcast live on the internet at www.ciphergen.com and will be accessible through the Investor Relations Section of Ciphergen's homepage. Additionally, a telephone replay of the teleconference will be available for 24 hours beginning at 2:00 p.m. (EDT) on June 26, 2001, and can be accessed by dialing Domestic: 800-475 6701 or International 320-365 3844, Access Code: 592860.<<
snip
Cheers, Tuck |
