Biotage has acquired Separtis Holding, the Swiss, German and Austrian distributor for many Biotage products, formerly the Argonaut Technologies consumable product range
Biotage will retain all current Separtis employees, assume the leased facilities in Grenzach-Wyhlen, and own all assets of Separtis, which is based in Grellingen, Switzerland with operating legal entities within Switzerland and Germany.
The turnover of the company in 2004 was euro 1.6million (SEK 14.6M) and all revenues were comprised of Biotage-produced products.
It is expected the acquisition should result in an annual revenue increase of SEK 7.5M.
"It has always been within our plans to move from distributors to direct sales and service within our key European markets.
"This acquisition, in combination with other recent distributor changes in the EU, allows us to now service our critical markets directly while raising our operating margins", stated Jeff Bork, CEO of Biotage.
Reinhard Kupferschmidt, the current senior sales manager and technical director, will become the head of all Biotage business activities in central and eastern Europe.
The existing Separtis business activities in Genzach-Wyhlen will continue as well.
"This substantially completes a crucial part of the Argonaut integration.
"For Biotage, it delivers critical skills and strong customer relationships in a vital EU region while providing the management talent necessary for our long term success," according to Dave Patteson, president of Biotage's discovery chemistry business.
Biotage is a global company active in life science research with strong technologies, a broad range of operations and a long-term view of the market.
The company offers knowledge and experience in the areas of genetic analysis and medicinal chemistry.
Customers include the world's top 30 pharmaceutical companies, 20 largest biotech companies and leading academic institutes.
The company is headquartered in Uppsala and has offices in the USA, Japan, UK and several other European countries.
Biotage has approximately 340 employees and had pro-forma sales of about SEK 500M in 2004.
