Roche has acquired Germany's PVT Probenverteiltechnik and its distribution unit based in Atlanta for €65 million ($91 million) upfront and up to €20 million ($28 million) in performance-related milestones. PVT provides customized automation and workflow solutions for in-vitro diagnostic testing in large commercial and hospital laboratories.
The companies are well-known to one another, having had a close partnership for more than 15 years. Roche has distributed PVT products, such as the RSA Pro and the RSD Pro system, in Europe, Asia and Latin America.
The acquisition will expand Roche's access to PVT's product portfolio for automation of pre- and post-analytical tasks, such as centrifuging, pipetting, sorting and archiving across a variety of sample formats. PVT's products enable clinical laboratories to reliably manage low to very high sample volumes and to arrange their lab space with great flexibility.
"Increasing laboratory consolidation leading to testing volumes of tens of thousands samples per day demand an ever-higher degree of automation," explains Daniel O'Day, COO of Roche Diagnostics, in a statement. "With PVT's technology we will be able to deliver integrated and highly-efficient automation solutions to meet the evolving needs of our customers and further strengthen our leading position in the clinical diagnostics market."
According to Roche, the newly acquired automation capabilities will strengthen its growth and competitive advantage in the laboratory core business, which had an estimated market size of $15.3 billion in 2009.
- get the Roche release