A Medical Device Daily

AMI Semiconductor (Pocatello, Idaho), a subsidiary of AMIS Holdings , said that it has agreed to acquire the Ultra Low Power (ULP) six-transistor (6T) SRAM and medical System-on-Chip ASIC businesses of NanoAmp Solutions (Milpitas, California) for about $21 million in cash, plus adjustment for closing inventory of the business.

NanoAmp specializes in low-voltage and ULP memory and ASIC solutions for the wireless communication, industrial, medical and networking market segments. Its ULP SRAM technology implemented in the 180 nm process is used by medical customers for implantable medical SOC applications.

AMI will acquire certain assets and assume certain liabilities related to NanoAmp Solutions' medical System-on-Chip business and its ULP 6T SRAM business, which collectively employ about 25 people in the U.S., Korea and Taiwan.

Christine King, president and CEO of AMI, said, “By combining NanoAmp's class-leading ULP SRAM technology with our ULP mixed-signal and digital signal processing capabilities, we are able to enhance our core competencies and strengthen our leadership position in the implantable medical market. In addition, this acquisition adds medical-qualified ULP SRAM technology to our core competencies, available as embedded IP or as ASSPs, as well as new design wins in the 180nm Medical SOC market.”

The businesses to be acquired consist primarily of designs that are still in development; however, the SRAM business is currently providing revenue, anticipated at $7 million to $8 million for 2006 as a whole. For the balance of 2006, the acquisition is expected to be neutral to non-GAAP earnings per share and be accretive by 1 cent per share in 2007. The transaction is expected to close during the third quarter.

AMIS manufactures silicon solutions, integrated mixed-signal products and structured digital products.

AMI Semiconductor has European corporate offices in Oudenaarde, Belgium, and a network of sales and design centers in North America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region.

Medical transcription service provider MedQuist (Mount Laurel, New Jersey) reported that it has entered into a license agreement with De-ID Data (Philadelphia) for its DE-ID de-identification software, saying the agreement will foster development of new medical data repository and reporting solutions to safely and securely import patient data from its customers.

V. “Juggy” Jagannathan, PhD, vice president of research at MedQuist, said, “DE-ID software offers considerable benefits over open-source options. It provides greater confidence and reliability in the protection of patients' privacy, [leading] to a higher level of research power and peace of mind for providers and researchers.”

Developed and tested at the University of Pittsburgh , DE-ID is software for automated, HIPAA-compliant de-identification of medical record and report text and currently the de-identification standard for the Cancer Bioinformatics Grid (caBIG) of the National Cancer Institute , a multi-hospital data-sharing grid.

De-ID Data Corp. develops and supports technology-based de-identification solutions to patient privacy issues for data mining, clinical research and clinical trial recruitment.

MedQuist, a member of the Philips Group of Companies, is a leading provider of clinical documentation workflow solutions in support of the electronic health record.

In other dealmaking:

• Radiation Therapy Services (RTS; Fort Myers, Florida), an operator of radiation therapy centers, said it has acquired a single radiation therapy treatment center in Bel Air, Maryland, for about $6.6 million.

RTS said it plans to combine the newly acquired practice with its existing practice in Belcamp, Maryland, by the end of 2006. The company expects its incremental revenue opportunity from the acquisition to be about $4 million on an annual basis. The acquisition is expected to be completed by mid-August.

RTS operates radiation treatment centers primarily under the name 21st Century Oncology, its 70 centers clustered into 23 local markets in 14 states.

• LHC Group (Lafayette, Louisiana), a provider of post-acute healthcare services primarily in rural markets in the southern U.S., reported completing its acquisition of Lifeline Home Health Care (Somerset, Kentucky) for about $15 million in cash.

LHC said the deal is its largest acquisition to date, including a patient census of 2,400 as well as about 350 employees. As a result of the acquisition, LHC Group now has 17 locations in 29 Kentucky counties with a population of more than 750,000 people.

Keith Myers, president/CEO of LHC, said, “The addition of Lifeline to LHC Group also will enable LHC Group to expand its footprint in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, which is a certificate-of-need state.”

LHC is a provider of post-acute healthcare services primarily in rural markets in the southern U.S. It provides home-based services through its home nursing agencies and hospices and facility-based services through its long-term acute care hospitals and rehabilitation facilities.

• HealthTronics (Austin, Texas) reported completing the previously reported sale of its Specialty Vehicles Division to Oshkosh Truck (Oshkosh, Wisconsin) for $140 million in cash. The deal was first disclosed in June (MDD, June 26, 2006).

HealthTronics said it used about $124 million of the sale proceeds to repay in full the term loans B under its senior credit facility.

HealthTronics provides healthcare services primarily to the urology community.