Roche Enters Noninvasive Prenatal test Market With Ariosa purchase
Alex Lash December 02, 2014
Alex Lash [Ben Fidler contributed to this file.] Eyeing the biotech IPO boom past this 12 months, Ariosa Diagnostics planned to head public because it battled better competitors within the prenatal testing field. but the San Jose, CA-primarily based company backed off in late April, and that was its closing likelihood. Multinational healthcare firm Roche has bought Ariosa for an undisclosed amount, the companies announced as of late. That puts Roche, whose sprawling molecular diagnostics business had no prenatal testing product unless now, in competitors with San Carlos, CA-based totally startup Natera, San Diego’s Sequenom (NASDAQ: SQNM), and Illumina (NASDAQ: ILMN) (through its buyout of Verinata well being in January 2013). Illumina paid $ 350 million up entrance for Verinata, with doubtlessly $ one hundred million extra. We don’t know how much Roche is paying for Ariosa, but in the week before it pulled its IPO strive, Ariosa used to be aiming to promote three.5 million shares within the $ 16 to $ 18 vary. A $ 17-per-share debut would have given the corporate a market worth of $ 323 million, in step with IPO analysts Renaissance Capital. Ariosa, the maker of a test for Down Syndrome and other chromosome abnormalities, has transform a key player in an rising business struggle to market prenatal genetic exams that use the mummy’s blood, no longer an invasive needle, to sample the fetus’s DNA. Its cohesion take a look at reeled in $ fifty three million in gross sales closing year, and $ 19.5 million through the first quarter of 2014, according to the most contemporary figures to be had. Ariosa stated in March that tapping the public markets would assist improve its gross sales and advertising of team spirit, which has been available on account that may just 2012. The agency sells its check to both basic or “excessive chance” pregnancies—deemed as such as a result of the mum’s age, or different factors. Of four million are living births in the U.S. each year about 500,000 are high-risk pregnancies, consistent with Ariosa’s regulatory filings. until now, Ariosa’s partnership with LabCorp has helped the company get third-birthday party payer protection for top risk pregnancies most effective. In 2014, the partnership used to be amended, with Ariosa claiming the fitting to market harmony within the U.S. and Canada by itself, or through other distributors. Ariosa stated in its IPO documents previous this year that enlargement of coverage into normal pregnancies could be “a vital component of accomplishing material commercial success.” competition used to be additionally fierce. because the innovation in DNA sequencing has increased, and its cost has plummeted, other corporations have sought to capitalize. in keeping with Ariosa’s regulatory filings past this year, Venrock (39.1 p.c) and domain buddies (24.zero %) are its largest stockholders, followed with the aid of Meritech Capital companions (9.4 p.c) and FMR LLC (6.5 p.c). the company raised simply over $ 70 million in fairness financing due to the fact that its inception in 2008.
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