Life Technologies acquires Compendia Bioscience

Life Technologies has announced the acquisition of Compendia Bioscience, a pre-eminent cancer bioinformatics company widely used by the pharmaceutical industry to identify novel gene targets for drug discovery and development. Its deep oncology expertise and proprietary assets will enhance Life’s diagnostic development capabilities across multiple platforms, including next-generation sequencing, qPCR and proteome analysis.

Compendia’s existing business will continue under the leadership of its current management team. The company’s oncology data, which is widely utilised by pharmaceutical companies in their drug development work, will extend Life’s abilities to both develop its own tests and to partner with pharmaceutical companies in companion diagnostic development.

“Compendia has become an integral part of the pharmaceutical industry’s cancer drug discovery programs, and in joining Life Technologies, we’ll gain the opportunity to expand the utility of Compendia even further,” said Daniel R Rhodes, Compendia’s CEO and co-founder, who will join Life Technologies following the acquisition.

Compendia co-founder Arul Chinnaiyan, MD, PhD, a pioneer in the field of cancer research, will serve as strategic adviser to Life Technologies, helping to shape the company’s further steps into personalised medicine.

In addition to enabling Life Technologies’ ability to develop its own lab-developed and commercial tests, the Compendia acquisition will enhance Life’s companion diagnostics effort and positions the company as a partner of choice for pharma.

The acquisition represents a significant step in Life Technologies’ strategy to develop its medical sciences business through internal development, partnerships and select acquisitions.

The financial terms of the deal are not being disclosed. The acquisition of Compendia Bioscience is expected to be neutral to 2012 earnings and accretive to the company’s overall ROIC by 2015.