NEW YORK – Laboratory Corporation of America said this week that it has entered a long-term laboratory relationship with nonprofit Catholic healthcare system Ascension. As part of the deal, Labcorp purchased select assets of Ascension’s outreach lab business and will manage its hospital-based labs in Alabama, Florida, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, New York, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, and Wisconsin.
Eurobio Scientific said this week that it has completed the acquisition of Genome Diagnostics, also known as GenDx. As part of the €135 million ($135 million) deal originally announced in August, Paris-based Eurobio is acquiring all outstanding shares of GenDx, which will continue operations at its Utrecht, Netherlands-based headquarters and its North American office in Chicago. GenDx CEO and Cofounder Wietse Mulder will remain executive director and a member of the board for an initial term of two years, while Cofounder Erik Rozemuller, GenDx's senior scientist for bioinformatics, will transition to a consultancy role to support the R&D team, Eurobio said.
Diagnostics for the Real World said this week that the New Zealand government has authorized the company's molecular SAMBA II SARS-COV-2, SAMBA II CoV-2/FluA/FluB, and SAMBA II SARS-CoV-2/RSV tests for sale and distribution. The SAMBA II system offers an end-to-end process and provides test results within one hour. The point-of-care system performs sample extraction, isothermal nucleic acid amplification, lateral flow detection, and result interpretation. Meanwhile, the SAMBA tests do not require cold chain transport or storage.
OpGen said this week that it has closed a previously announced direct offering of 9,660,000 shares of its common stock and 33,810 shares of its Series C mirroring preferred stock, as well as a concurrent private placement of unregistered warrants to purchase up to 9,660,000 shares of common stock, at a purchase price of $.35 per share of common stock. The offering raised approximately $3.38 million, funding that will be used to continue the US commercialization of the firm’s Acuitas AMR Gene Panel, to support commercialization of other products with a focus on the Unyvero platform and tests, and to support further development and commercialization of subsidiary Ares Genetics’ database. The proceeds will also be used for sales and marketing efforts, to invest in manufacturing and operations infrastructure, and to repay certain outstanding debts.
Waters said this week that along with IDA Ireland, it is investing up to €6 million ($6.7 million) to expand its operations in Wexford, Ireland, to fund research and development of new clinical diagnostics products. The company plans to develop mass spectrometry-based clinical diagnostics. The Wexford facility is the primary manufacturing site for Waters’ in vitro diagnostic (IVD) systems, reagent kits, and software.
Gemina Laboratories this week announced an agreement with International Point of Care to manufacture Gemina's Legio X COVID-19 Rapid Antigen Test. The deal, which also includes a supply agreement and license agreement, sets the terms under which IPOC will manufacture the Legio X test in Canada for distribution in areas that recognize CE marking, which the test received in May. Gemina and IPOC originally forged a partnership in 2021. IPOC has also offered to defer C$500,000 (US$364,000) of invoicing costs, covering the final stages of product validation, Gemina said.
Eurofins Viracor said this week that it has opened a new laboratory in Lenexa, Kansas. The 110,000-square-foot facility will be used by 450 employees, including 215 current and 235 new ones. It is part of the firm's investment to meet growing customer demand for biopharma and clinical diagnostic testing services.
In Brief This Week is a selection of news items that may be of interest to our readers but had not previously appeared on 360Dx.