NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Bio-Techne announced today that it has agreed to acquire Advanced Cell Diagnostics for $250 million in cash, plus an additional consideration of $75 million if certain milestones are achieved.
The deal is expected to close on or about August 1, and will be financed through a combination of cash on hand and a revolving line of credit facility that Bio-Techne said it expects to obtain. The company expects the acquisition to be slightly dilutive to its adjusted earnings per share for fiscal year 2017, and accretive thereafter.
"We are very pleased to have ACD as part of Bio-Techne," said President and CEO Charles Kummeth in a statement. "ACD marks Bio-Techne's entry into the genomics field and market."
ACD develops and commercializes consumables for use in genomic analysis, and has a current product line of more than 9,000 probe reagents and reagent kits for manual and automated use sold worldwide. The company also markets an RNA in-situ hybridization technology called RNAscope, which enables researchers to visualize expression of many genes in individual cells while retaining information on tissue morphology.
ACD was founded in 2006 by current CEO Yuling Luo and Steve Chen, and has more than 100 employees, Bio-Techne said. The firm reported annual revenues of approximately $25 million for the last twelve months with an annualized growth rate of approximately 50 percent.
"[ACD's] innovative and versatile technology has the potential to change pathology practices. RNA-ISH is a transformative technology facilitating and improving the monitoring of gene expression patterns at the single-cell level, while retaining the morphological context of the tissue being analyzed," Kummeth said. "ACD's technology serves both research and diagnostic markets, expanding Bio-Techne's presence in the clinical lab setting. With broader adoption of the technology in the diagnostic arena, it has the potential to revolutionize the choice of reagents in diagnostic practices, such as oncology, infectious diseases, and others."
Luo noted that the combined business represents "a one-stop-shop for our customers and positions us well to compete and expand in the global market."
In March, Bio-Techne announced it had acquired single-cell western blotting firm Zephyrus Biosciences for an undisclosed amount. The company said it would integrate Zephyrus into its protein platforms division. In a statement at the time, Kummeth said the deal "demonstrates our continued interest in western blotting, a vital technique in protein identification and characterization," adding, "This new technology brings this technique to the single cell level."
Bio-Techne's shares rose less than 1 percent to $113.75 in morning trading on the Nasdaq.