A Diagnostics & Imaging Week

Immucor, (Norcross, Georgia) a developer of automated instrument-reagent systems to the blood transfusion industry, said it has closed its previously reported $117 million acquisition of BioArray Solutions (Warren, New Jersey), maker of the BeadChip system.

Gioacchino De Chirico, president/CEO of Immucor, said, "We are pleased to have completed this acquisition, which we believe will enable us to provide innovative molecular diagnostic solutions for blood transfusions to enhance patient outcomes."

Immucor said BioArray would continue to be based in Warren, New Jersey and operate under the BioArray Solutions name.

According to BioArray, its BeadChip system is designed to deploy planar arrays of encoded microparticles to perform rapid and reliable molecular analysis of nucleic acids and proteins. Its recently launched transfusion genotyping system is installed in a number of leading donor and transfusion centers for research use only, the company noted.

Immucor said it expects to provide more information about the BioArray acquisition on its investors conference call in October to review the results of its first fiscal quarter.

Bederra (Houston) a medical imaging and diagnostic company, reported today that its wholly-owned subsidiary Lumar Imaging (Houston), has entered into a joint venture (j-v) agreement with Basic Solutions.

Basic Solutions will offer mobile cardiac stress testing and cardiac imaging services from Lumar's diagnostic medical imaging facility in Houston.

Lumar provides MRI, CT, ultrasound and pain management services to the greater Houston area and is located next to Texas Medical Center.

"This j-v creates one of the few, if any, diagnostic imaging services companies in the city of Houston that offers both fixed and mobile diagnostic imaging services. Since diagnostic imaging is often a precursor to cardiac imaging, this j-v creates a synergistic marketing opportunity to substantially increase our patient referral network," said Graham Williams, CEO of Bederra. "We anticipate new business gained from this j-v will add $1 million to $2 million in revenues for Lumar in 2008."

Bederra also reported that its Lumar Imaging subsidiary will offer nuclear imaging services in areas such as cardiac, bone, brain, thyroid, gastrointestinal and a variety of other specialized imaging tests, as part of a joint-venture agreement with Advanced Nuclear Consultants (Houston).

"Since diagnostic imaging is the precursor to nuclear imaging, our j-v with Advanced Nuclear is ideal for extending the doctor referral network," said Graham Williams, CEO of Bederra.

Williams said Bederra expects the j-v will bring in an additional $1 million a year for Lumar.

Advanced Nuclear Consultants provides national sales, service and technical support for nuclear imaging systems. The company specializes in nuclear medicine consulting for private practice, diagnostic imaging centers and hospitals.

In other dealmaking news:

• Covidien (Mansfield, Massachusetts) reported the acquisition of technology assets from CardioDigital (Portland, Oregon), a company that develops advanced signal processing techniques for patient monitoring.

The technology will be used by Covidien's Respiratory and Monitoring Solutions business unit. Covidien said it reflects the company's "commitment to making investments in clinically relevant product innovations designed to improve patient outcomes." Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

"The acquisition of CardioDigital's technology is an exciting opportunity for us to strengthen our patient monitoring business as we partner with our customers to improve outcomes. We believe that the technology will enable significant improvements in current patient monitoring techniques, resulting in enhanced patient care and safety," said Joe Almeida, president of the Medical Devices segment at Covidien.

CardioDigital's technology will complement Respiratory and Monitoring Solution's Nellcor pulse oximetry platform, Covidien said.

"This acquisition sets the stage for more of these types of growth opportunities in the future," Almeida said.

Covidien makes a diverse range of products in four segments: medical devices, imaging solutions, pharmaceutical products and medical supplies.

CardioDigital provides commercialization of near-to-market technologies developed by its research organization, CardioDigital Ltd., in Edinburgh, Scotland.

NDS Surgical Imaging (NDSsi; San Jose, California) reported the acquisition of Dome Imaging Systems, the medical business unit of Planar Systems (Beaverton, Oregon). Dome makes medical display products for diagnostic imaging and patient care applications. Its customers include global picture archiving and communication systems OEM suppliers and medical information technology resellers to healthcare providers.

NDSsi delivers visualization systems designed to enable imaging informatics in surgery.

• Gene Express (Wilmington, North Carolina) reported that it has signed three definitive agreements with NeoGenomics Laboratories (Fort Myers, Florida) to license the SEM Center and StaRT-PCR (Standardized Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction) Technology.

NeoGenomics will support Gene Express in its FDA validation of its Lung Cancer Risk Prediction and BCR/ABL tests. The agreements also will allow NeoGenomics to commercialize Gene Express diagnostic tests, validate future Gene Express technology to fulfill FDA requirements, and utilize StaRT-PCR for its own commercial activities. These agreements succeed in establishing a key validation and commercialization partnership between Gene Express and NeoGenomics.

Over the next year, Gene Express will be undertaking activities to develop these genetic tests and bring them to market. Such activities will include clinical trials to validate the lung cancer risk prediction test, submission of the data to the FDA, manufacturing of a regulatory compliant standard mixture of internal standards (SMIS) for the testing of BCR/ABL gene expression, clinical trials to validate the SMIS, and clinical trials to support a regulatory approved molecular diagnostic with internal standards for BCR/ABL.