NEW YORK ─ Oxford Immunotec's stock price was up 15 percent at the start of trading on Friday on a report that a consortium of private equity firms, KKR and Ampersand Capital Partners, has approached it with a $400 million acquisition offer.
KKR and Ampersand Capital have proposed acquiring Oxford Immunotec for around $15 per share in cash, Reuters said on Thursday, adding that the offer is preliminary and was submitted to Oxford Immunotec in the last few days.
"We do not comment on rumours," Oxford Immunotec CEO Peter Wrighton-Smith said in an email to 360Dx.
Oxford Immunotec's shares were trading at $15.04 on the Nasdaq at the start of trading on Friday.
In a research note on Friday, Cowen analyst Doug Schenkel said he believes that based on an initial valuation analysis, the preliminary bid "is likely not sufficient."
In March, Thermo Fisher Scientific had announced plans to acquire Qiagen, Oxford Immunotec's competitor in the market for interferon gamma release assay-based latent TB tests, for approximately $11.5 billion in cash.