Date: 2011-07-19
Type of information: Company acquisition
Acquired company: mtm laboratories (Germany)
Acquiring company: Roche (Switzerland)
Amount: Under the terms of the agreement, Roche will pay mtm shareholders an upfront payment of approximately €130 million (180 million USD) as well as up to approximately € 60 million (85 million USD) upon reaching performance-related milestones.
Terms: Roche has signed an agreement under which it will acquire 100 percent of mtm laboratories AG (mtm), a privately-held company based in Heidelberg. mtm is a global leader in developing in vitro diagnostics with a focus on early detection and diagnosis of cervical cancer, the largest early detection market in oncology. mtm will become part of Roche's Tissue Diagnostics (Ventana Medical Systems, Inc.) business unit. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the coming weeks.
Details: mtm's proprietary test solutions are based on the p16 biomarker and have been developed for the identification and diagnosis of pre-cancerous cervical lesions. p16, a gene involved in tumor suppression in the cell, is an established marker of the early oncogenic process leading to cancer. The level of p16 protein becomes markedly increased after persistent HPV infection leads to oncogenic transformation of cells in the cervix. The mtm CINtec® Plus Cytology kit is approved for use in Europe to identify over-expression of p16 in cervical Pap test samples to detect pre-cancerous lesions. This could aid in the classification of patients with abnormal Pap or positive HPV results into those with and without significant pre-cancer or cancer, reducing unnecessary biopsies and ensuring patients are treated appropriately. CINtec® Plus broadens the Roche solution in cervical cancer testing, in addition to the cobas HPV assay, both approaches may provide discrete and complementary benefits to patient management. mtm's second product, CINtec® Histology detects over-expression of p16 and is used in conjunction with traditional staining techniques to aid in the identification of high-grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) and cervical carcinoma in biopsy samples. This assay complements Roche's current market-leading menu of tissue-based cancer diagnostics. In addition to p16's benefit to cervical cancer testing, p16 has been reported to have emerging clinical utility in other cancers, including anogenital cancers, head and neck cancer, lung cancer, and breast cancer.
The CINtec® Plus Cytology kit is approved for use in Europe to identify p16 and Ki-67 proteins in cervical Pap test samples. In the US, CINtec® PLUS is available for research use only. Roche will seek FDA pre-market approval (PMA) based on planned clinical trials. The CINtec® Histology Kit is available worldwide as an IVD product (class I IVD in the US) for qualitative detection of p16 antigens in cervical biopsies. FDA pre-market approval (PMA) is in the planning phases.
Related: In vitro diagnostic
