Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics has signed an exclusive deal worth up to $69 million with commercial-stage company Quotient to distribute and sell a blood transfusion diagnostics platform in development.
The Quotient platform, dubbed MosaiQ, aims to shorten the time it takes to get test results and to offer more comprehensive matching of donor and patient blood than currently available transfusion diagnostic instruments.
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| Ortho-Clinical CEO Martin Madaus |
"We believe this strategic relationship with Quotient for the innovative MosaiQ technology has the potential to bring completely new solutions to the global transfusion diagnostics market," Ortho-Clinical Chairman and CEO Martin Madaus said.
Under the terms of the agreement, Quotient will develop, launch and manufacture MosaiQ, while Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics will head up efforts to sell the product to customers. Ortho-Clinical will have exclusive rights to distribute MosaiQ for the global patient testing market and the donor testing market in the developing world and Japan. Quotient retains all rights to commercialize MosaiQ in the developed world for the donor testing market.
"Quotient believes that MosaiQ will deliver significant improvements for transfusion diagnostics customers, worldwide," said Quotient Chairman and CEO Paul Cowan.
Quotient is eligible to receive up to $59 million for certain regulatory and commercialization milestones related to the approval and launch of MosaiQ in the U.S. and the European Union. Ortho-Clinical will also invest $10 million in new Quotient ordinary shares at an issue price of $22.50 per share and $15 million in new Quotient redeemable preferred shares with a 7% annual dividend.
Recently, Ortho landed a CE Mark for its fully automated Ortho Vision Analyzer for transfusion medicine laboratories. The new collaboration will help boost Ortho-Clinical's breadth of offerings over time, the company said. Last year, Johnson & Johnson ($JNJ) sold Ortho-Clinical to the Carlyle Group for $4.15 billion. Since then, Ortho has been trying to chart growth through partnerships. In December, the company launched Astute Medical's test for acute kidney injury in the U.S.
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