A Diagnostics & Imaging Week

Diamics (Novato, California), a privately held company developing products for cancer screening and diagnostics, including cervical cancer, reported that Inverness Medical Innovations (IMI; Waltham, Massachusetts), a maker of rapid diagnostic products for the consumer and professional women's healthcare markets, has committed to a $6 million staged equity investment in Diamics. IMI has acquired 51% of the company and assumed a seat on Diamics' three-person Board.

"We are delighted that Inverness has acknowledged the progress of the company and the value of our novel technologies focused on improving cervical cancer screening and are confident that Inverness' expertise in the areas of women's health care and point-of-care diagnostics will help drive commercialization of our products," said Peter Gombrich, CEO, Diamics. "I am very much looking forward to working with Inverness and welcoming their involvement in Diamics."

IMI said it will provide strategic and hands-on assistance in key areas including assay development, product design, manufacturing and distribution.

Diamics is developing a line of products designed to improve the effectiveness of cervical cancer screening and make the procedure less painful for patients. Currently, the company is producing its FDA-cleared CerCol cervical cancer collection system, a soft-tipped device, for use with its Pap-Map system. Together, these components allow the clinician to painlessly capture 360 degrees of cervical material and transfer the cells, with their spatial orientation intact, to a slide to support localization of identified lesions. Diamics' point-of-care offering, the C-Map system, is now in pre-clinical trials. The C-Map system combines a method for cervical sampling and slide preparation with immunological probes that characterize the biological features of the sample. The C-Map system uses automation to identify abnormalities as expressed within the context of normal cellular morphology and eliminates the need for a cell by cell analysis, yielding greater sensitivity and specificity than cytology,according to the company.

Sontra Medical (Franklin, Massachusetts) reported that it completed the final closing of an equity financing transaction in which it received about $1,815,000 from individuals, including a total of $105,000 invested by a member of the board of directors and an executive officer of the company, and institutions, each of whom is an accredited investor, in a series of closings.

The company issued 1,815,000 units in the financing at a purchase price of $1 per unit. Each unit is comprised of one share of the company's common stock, and a warrant to purchase 0.3 shares of the company's common stock at an exercise price of $1.40.

The company previously disclosed the first two closings of the financing, in which it raised about $1.25 million. The final closing of the financing, in which the company raised an additional $565,000, occurred on July 16.

Sontra Medical owns technology in ultrasound and skin permeation methods used in transdermal science for therapeutic and diagnostic applications, and is developing a non-invasive, continuous transdermal glucose monitor (CTGM) for use in the diabetes and intensive care markets. The CTGM device makes use of the FDA-approved SonoPrep ultrasound-mediated skin permeation system.

• Biomagnetics Diagnostics (Orangevale, California) reported that it has completed a corporate restructure. Through the efforts of its President and CEO Clayton Hardman, the company just completed a restructuring involving the return of 15,308,938 million shares back to the treasury and reorganization of the board.

"We're in the business of developing medical diagnostics systems and would be remiss in not diagnosing ourselves," said Hardman. "Our analysis indicated we needed to be proactive on an ongoing basis which would facilitate not only the acquisition of additional capital investment to continue product development but would also build a solid foundation for a potential future buyout."

Biomagnetics Diagnostics is a developer of diagnostic equipment and immunoassays.

• Cytyc (Marlborough, Massachusetts) reported that it is delivering a notice to the holders of its 2.25% senior convertible notes due 2024 (CUSIP Nos. 232946 AA 1 and 232946 AB 9) in connection with Section 15.01(a)(i) of the indenture between Cytyc and U.S. Bank Trust National Association, as trustee, under which the convertible notes were issued.

The notice advises that effective July 1, holders are entitled to convert the convertible notes into shares of Cytyc common stock due to the closing sale price of Cytyc common stock exceeding 120% of the convertible notes conversion price for at least twenty trading days out of the last thirty trading days in the quarter ended June 30.

The conversion price of the convertible notes is $29.67 under the indenture. The convertible notes will remain convertible into shares of Cytyc common stock at any time at the option of the holder through maturity.

Cytyc makes diagnostic and surgical products.