Phase Forward announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Lincoln Technologies in an all-cash transaction valued at $11 million, plus up to an additional $6 million based on achievement of certain financial targets in 2005 and 2006. Based in Wellesley, Massachusetts, Lincoln Technologies is a provider of products and services for strategic pharmacovigilance, clinical trial safety signal detection, and applied data standards. Together, the two companies will meet a wider set of customer needs and expect to have a significant opportunity to grow in the life sciences market. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of August 2005, subject to customary closing conditions. The boards of directors of both companies have approved the agreement. Read the press release.
Libertas Academica Ltd. has announced a new, open-access, international online peer-reviewed research journal dedicated to the bioinformatics of cancer. This new journal, Cancer Informatics, publishes papers at the interface of computing and cancer research. The journal's editor-in-chief, Dr. James Lyons-Weiler, of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, created the journal with Publisher Tim Hill in response to cancer researchers' need to sort through the abundant literature in bioinformatics, computational biology, mathematical biology, biostatistics, and epidemiology. "Researching clinicians do not have the time to search for the latest-breaking developments in research computing distributed across dozens of journals,” says Lyons-Weiler. “Our journal will provide one-stop shopping for cutting-edge advances in informatics solutions for every area cancer research, including genomic and proteomic biomarker-based cancer computer models for cancer detection, diagnosis, prognosis and therapy response.” Cancer Informatics recently won MedLine indexing, which means its contents will be archived by the National Institutes of Health's journals database, Pubmed. Read more.
Odyssey Thera Inc. announced today the signing of an agreement with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to advance the goals of the Molecular Libraries Roadmap Initiative. Under the agreement, Odyssey Thera will provide the NIH Chemical Genomics Center (NCGC) with access to proprietary human cell lines with state-of-the-art technology for screening biochemical pathways in living cells. The technology, known as PCA (protein-fragment complementation assays), provides fluorescence sensors of bio-molecular interactions inside human cells. Since these interactions comprise the pathways that regulate human health and disease processes, the assays enable screening for small molecules with direct relevance for pharmaceutical discovery. The NCGC will use high-tech systems to screen its repository of over 100,000 chemically diverse small molecules against these pathways. Website: http://www.odysseythera.com.
Bruker AXS GmbH announced that it has signed a binding agreement to acquire all shares of privately held SOCABIM SAS, a company focused on advanced X-ray materials research and analysis software. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2006. SOCABIM was founded in 1977 and has developed into a major supplier of software for X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray fluorescence (XRF) materials analysis to Bruker AXS. With this acquisition, Bruker AXS is significantly expanding its core technology base in two of its strategic product and applications areas. The acquisition will not add to Bruker AXS’ revenue, but is expected to increase the Bruker AXS gross margin by more than one percent. For Bruker BioSciences Corporation the transaction is expected to be accretive by $0.01 per share in 2006. Website: http://www.bruker-axs.de/