ICON (Dublin, Ireland) reported its payment or issuance date, and the Nasdaq ex-date for its bonus issue of ADSs.

The bonus shares will be issued to holders of ADSs on August 12, 2008. The trading price of ICON's ADSs to effect the Bonus Issue should adjust prior to the opening of trading on August 13, 2008, the ex-date set by Nasdaq.

The effect of the bonus issue of one new ADS to the holder of record on August 8, 2008 of each existing ADS will be the equivalent of a 2-for-1 stock split.

ICON provides outsourced development services to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device industries.

Affymetrix to close West Sacramento plant

Affymetrix (Santa Clara, California) said it will close its West Sacramento plant sometime next year, relocating the bulk of the work to a company facility in Singapore.

The move affects about 100 workers, although some are expected to find work elsewhere in the company.

The move came as Affymetrix has struggled financially. In July, it reported that it lost $3.6 million in the second quarter amid a 1.6% drop in revenue.

The company is also closing its South San Francisco plant.

The West Sacramento plant opened in 1999 and has specialized in making something called the GeneChip, a glass wafer coated with DNA.

The plant also makes chemicals and instruments used for analyzing the chips. Those functions will also be leaving West Sacramento, but it's not clear where they'll go.

Hitachi reports open MRI installed at St. Mary

Hitachi Medical Systems America (Twinsburg, Ohio) said the first OASIS high-field open MRI has been installed and is available for clinical use at St. Mary Medical Center (Langhorne, Pennsylvania). The OASIS is the highlight in a multi-million dollar MRI expansion at St. Mary Imaging.

OASIS is a high-field open MRI system, which delivers high-speed gradients, multi-channel RF technology and unmatched Zenith RF Coils to the only truly open architecture high-performance systems ever installed.

"As technology has continued to progress, the differences in image quality and patient comfort have been minimized," said Daniel Cohen, St. Mary Medical Director of MRI. "We now can offer patients the security of a spacious design for added comfort during scans while simultaneously providing the most accurate scan results to aid physicians in their diagnoses."