NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – EMD Millipore has inked an agreement to acquire the microbiology business of Germany's Biotest for an undisclosed sum. The business had around €50 million ($70.4 million) in sales in 2010, and it is expected to strengthen EMD Millipore's Biomonitoring business.
In late 2009, Bio-Rad Laboratories had acquired certain diagnostic businesses of Biotest for €45 million.
The Ontario Institute for Cancer Research said this week that it has invested an undisclosed amount in a program being carried out at the University of Toronto to develop a palm-sized device that uses digital microfluidics to manipulate cells and tiny droplets of liquid on an open platform with no moving parts. The Smart Well Plate technology is being developed in the labs of Aaron Wheeler at the University of Toronto and Jeff Wrana, a senior investigator at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital. OICR said that it would work closely with MaRS Innovation, the lead commercialization agent for the technology and the Innovations & Partnerships Office of the University of Toronto to support effective commercialization of the Smart Well Plate.
HTG, formerly known as High-Throughput Genomics, has changed its name to HTG Molecular Diagnostics. Last month, the Tucson, Ariz.-based firm completed the first tranche of a Series D financing round, raising $15.7 million.
Norwegian bioinformatics firm Isentio said this week that it has opened a new office in Sunnyvale, Calif. In a statement, the firm said "this presence in the innovative environment of Silicon Valley, with access to key resources and customers, is crucial for the company to meet its objectives to make RipSeq the leading DNA analysis tool for pathogen identification."
In December, Isentio announced that it had raised $1.5 million to grow its sales and marketing efforts and accelerate development of new application areas for its RipSeq software.