A Medical Device Daily

CardioVasc (Menlo Park, California) and Acta Vascular Systems (Santa Clara, California) reported that they have completed a merger transaction in which CardioVasc has acquired Acta Vascular for an undisclosed sum.

The new combined entity will be called Nfocus Neuromedical and combine aneurysm treatment technology of CardioVasc with the established detachable balloon technology of Acta Vascular to serve the less invasive neurosurgery market known as interventional neuroradiology.

The new company also reported that it has completed a $20.3 million Series B private equity financing. The company said the funds will be used to support programs aimed at treatment of brain aneurysms that cause hemorrhagic stroke.

Oxford Bioscience Partners of Boston and Technology Partners of Palo Alto led the round and were joined by existing investor DFJ e-Planet Ventures.

"Endovascular treatments for neurovascular disorders such as aneurysms are growing significantly and yet still represent enormous areas for improvement. With the recent merger to create Nfocus, we are excited about the opportunity to significantly help patients," said Omar Amirana, MD, investment manager, Oxford Biosciences.

Nfocus said it will immediately apply the funds to bring its current aneurysm and fistula treatment devices to market in Europe and the U.S. The company's development programs are focused on providing faster, simpler and more permanent treatment of hemorrhagic stroke conditions through endovascular devices.

Imran, CardioVasc co-founder and director, said "we have united a fantastic technology platform with solid investors and a proven team of entrepreneurs in the field of aneurysm treatment."

Hemorrhagic stroke caused by ruptured aneurysms is a critical and often life-threatening event most frequently brought on by a rupturing aneurysm or other vascular malformation. In tens of thousands of cases, open surgery may not be ideal or even possible, but the alternative, today's endovascular devices, may not provide permanent treatment. It is these critical and underserved patients and their physicians, the interventional neuroradiologist and neurosurgeon, that Nfocus is committed to serve.

"I look forward building on our partnership with the physicians in the field to develop the tools that they have been asking for and help them to expand on their success with treating aneurysms in the brain," said Martin Dieck, president/CEO of Nfocus.

The transaction has received the requisite approval of both CardioVasc and Acta shareholders and the merger was completed prior to the financing, the companies said.

In other deal news: Thermo Fisher Scientific (Waltham, Massachusetts) said it has completed the sale of its Genevac (Valley Cottage, New York) business, a manufacturer of vacuum concentrators, to private equity firm Riverlake Equity Partners, which said it eventually intends merge Genevac into its laboratory equipment products and services company, SP Industries (Warminster, Pennsylvania).

On November 9, 2006, Thermo Electron Corporation merged with Fisher Scientific International Inc. to form Thermo Fisher Scientific. The European Commission and the Federal Trade Commission required the divestiture of Genevac, a $17 million business of Fisher Scientific, as the sole condition to their approval of that company's $10.6 billion merger with Thermo Electron which occurred in November of last year (MDD, Nov. 10, 2006).