NEW YORK — Natera announced this week that the District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina granted its request to add a patent in its ongoing lawsuit against NeoGenomics. That lawsuit now includes patent number 11,319,596, in addition to patent 11,530,454. Natera asserts that NeoGenomics’ RaDaR test for minimal residual disease infringes those patents. The court had previously granted a preliminary injunction followed by a permanent injunction against a previous version of the RaDaR test.
Becton Dickinson this week announced that it reached a settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm agreed to pay a $175 million civil penalty and to retain an independent compliance consultant but neither admitted nor denied the findings of an SEC investigation related to the BD Alaris infusion pump. The SEC previously determined that BD continued to sell the Alaris pump after making software changes requiring regulatory review, and when the software was later found to have flaws, the SEC said BD misled investors by not disclosing the material impacts of these actions but rather reaffirming its financial guidance. The $175 million was reserved and disclosed in the company's fiscal year 2024 Form 10-K and was considered in its fiscal year 2025 cash flow plan, BD said, and the company is not updating its fiscal 2025 guidance as a result of the settlement.
Tempus this week said that it has signed agreements for in-network provider status with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois, Blue Shield of California, and laboratory benefit manager Avalon Healthcare Solutions. Under its agreement with Avalon, Tempus is a participating provider with BCBS North Carolina, BCBS South Carolina, BCBS Vermont, Capital BlueCross, and CareSource in four markets. Patients with these insurance plans will now have access to Tempus' comprehensive molecular profiling portfolio.
T2 Biosystems announced this week that it extended its multiyear capital equipment supplier agreement with group purchasing organization Vizient through March 31, 2026. The agreement allows Vizient members access to broader exposure and contracted pricing for the T2Dx Instrument, the T2Bacteria Panel, and the T2Candida Panel.
Polish life sciences firm Scope Fluidics said this week that it recently finalized the sale of its Curiosity Diagnostics subsidiary to Bio-Rad Laboratories for $130 million after receiving the final payments for the deal. Two years ago, Bio-Rad announced that the firms had reached a $170 million agreement for the acquisition of Curiosity Diagnostics, which had been developing a PCR system called PCR One. That sample-to-answer PCR testing system is used for the detection of up to 20 targets, with a turnaround time of 15 minutes.
Lucid Diagnostics said this week that it has formed a partnership with the first responder-focused healthcare provider VitalExam to offer firefighters access to Lucid's EsoGuard Esophageal DNA Test that is used for the early detection of esophageal precancer. Lucid noted that it has been pursuing partnerships through a direct contracting initiative to increase near-term revenues from the EsoGuard assay and complement the company's efforts to secure reimbursement for the test. In September, the firm also inked a deal with Front Line Mobile Health to explore opportunities to promote EsoGuard among firefighters and other first responders.
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.