Invitrogen Corporation, a leading life science company providing innovative technologies to support disease research, announced the acquisitions of Quantum Dot Corporation and the BioPixels business unit of BioCrystal, Ltd. and the early closing of the Biosource International, Inc. acquisition.
The acquisition of Quantum Dots and BioPixels bolster Invitrogen's Molecular Probes business as the leader in advanced labeling and detection technologies. Invitrogen also announced an agreement with Georgia Tech Research Corporation to exclusively license novel "nanocluster" technology. Taken together, the combination of these acquisitions and licenses will enable Invitrogen to create new innovative products that enable life science researchers to better visualize and understand cellular processes, molecular interactions, and other factors essential to diagnosing and treating disease. Terms of the acquisitions and license were not disclosed.
"Invitrogen's Molecular Probes business is the market leader in organic chemistry-based labeling and detection technologies," said Augie Sick, General Manager of Molecular Probes. "These acquisitions, when combined with the license from Georgia Tech, provide Invitrogen with a significant intellectual property position and robust platform for product development based on advanced inorganic materials science for molecular detection. Moreover, by adding several exciting new products, including widely known Quantum Dot Corporation's Qdots particles to our product portfolio, we remain well positioned for continued strong growth."
"Molecular labeling and detection technologies are a cornerstone of Invitrogen's business and represent one of the fastest growing segments in life sciences. The ability to illuminate biological processes taking place, such as whether a defect in the function of a heart cell is causing a patient's heart disease, is becoming a preferred method for molecular research and diagnostic applications," explained Gregory T. Lucier, Chairman and CEO of Invitrogen Corporation. "By adding advanced nanotechnology capabilities to our existing labeling and detection franchise, Invitrogen has positioned itself at the cutting edge of this exciting field, providing innovative solutions for use by our customers and in our own research and development of novel technologies in proteomics, genomics, gene expression, and imaging."
Quantum Dot Corporation offers novel solutions for biomolecular labeling and detection that employ Quantum Dot (Qdot) semi-conductor nanocrystals, which emit bright light in a range of sharp colors. The unique properties of these nanometer-sized Qdot particles include excellent photostability and narrow emission spectra and brightness, making them well suited for a wide range of applications within life sciences and beyond. For example, these Qdots now enable cell biologists to monitor the division of living cells through more than eight generations, in real time, over a period of up to a week. The company also holds the broadest intellectual property portfolio in the life science industry for semi-conductor nanocrystals with more than 160 patents and applications, and has built a significant customer base that is now using this latest labeling and detection technology.
BioPixels provides novel coatings and metal alloys for semi-conductor nanocrystals. These specially coated, fluorescent nanocrystals have been applied to multicolor labeling, sorting and imaging of cells, lateral flow immunoassays, and fluorescent inks and represent a promising technology for the development of automated assays of complex biological samples. The combination of BioPixels technology with Quantum Dot's semi-conductor nanocrystals will allow the creation of smaller, brighter, lower toxicity particles that do not blink. The acquisition of BioPixels also brings a rich intellectual property portfolio to Invitrogen in advanced labeling technologies.
The agreement with Georgia Tech Research Corporation provides an exclusive license to new metal nanocluster technology. These noble metal nanoclusters, developed by Robert Dickson and Jie Zhang at Georgia Institute of Technology, are extremely small and extremely bright fluorescent particles, comprising only a few gold or silver atoms, exhibiting unique physical and optical properties that make them particularly well suited for in vivo as well as in vitro applications. The advantage of these nanoclusters is that they are exceptionally photostable and offer up to ten times the fluorescence of semi-conductor nanocrystals, permitting true single molecule detection and representing another approach to the next-generation of high sensitivity labeling and detection applications.
Biosource International, Inc. Acquisition Close
Separately, Invitrogen also announced that it has completed its acquisition of Biosource International, Inc. This deal augments Invitrogen's growing collection of protein and primary antibody products gained through its acquisitions of Zymed Laboratories and Caltag Laboratories earlier this year. Additionally, Biosource bolsters Invitrogen's offerings in both kinase and cytokine assay technologies for research applications and provides the company an opportunity to enter new markets in immunology, oncology and neurodegenerative disease.
The financial impact of the acquisition of Quantum Dot and BioPixels, as well as the early closing of BioSource International, Inc., will be discussed on the Company's third quarter earnings call on October 27, 2005.
