Bio-Rad Closes Acquisition of Ciphergen's Proteomics Tools Division
Bio-Rad Laboratories has finalized its purchase of Ciphergen Biosystems’ proteomics tools business, the company said this week.
The companies had expected the deal, which was announced in August, to close November 1, but it was delayed after receiving shareholder approval in late October.
Bio-Rad paid Ciphergen $20 million in cash and made a $3 million equity investment in the company to purchase its ProteinChip business and worldwide technology rights to its Surface Enhanced Laser Desorption Ionization (SELDI) technology. Also included in the agreement are “certain product lines,” manufacturing capability, intellectual property, and rights to Ciphergen’s established customer base.
Bio-Rad CEO Norman Schwartz said in a statement that the acquisition of Ciphergen’s tools for protein profiling and biomarker discovery will enable the company to “offer a more complete range of tools of proteomics workflows.”
Large Dutch Genotyping Study to Use Illumina
BeadStations, HumanHap550 BeadChips
Illumina last week said that Erasmus MC, the University Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, has purchased two BeadStations for a large genotyping study.
As part of the so-called “Rotterdam Study,” researchers will use the instruments along with Illumina’s Infinium HumanHap550 BeadChip to genotype more than 10,000 samples.
These samples come from 80 percent of the residents of a Rotterdam suburb, which have been monitored for 17 years for the onset of late-stage diseases that include neurological, cardiovascular, endocrine, locomotor and opthalmological conditions.
Erasmus researcher Andre Utterlinden said he hopes the study will contribute to the field of “genome-wide association analyses for these common diseases” in order to assist in drug development and in clinical research
Harvard Medical School Purchases BioForce Nano eNabler
BioForce Nanosciences last week announced the sale of a Nano eNabler system to Harvard Medical School’s Technology and Engineering Center. Funding for the purchase was provided by an award from the National Human Genome Research Institute, BioForce said.
BioForce added that HMS will use the system to print femtoliter volumes of biomolecules onto nanohole array sensors with sub-micron dimensions. The nanohole array sensing technology is a label-free detection system.
Financial details were not discussed.