Company Announcements

Shimadzu announced in June a collaborative research agreement with Japan’s National Cancer Center in the areas of early cancer diagnosis, pharmacokinetic analysis and medical treatments.

In June, JEOL opened a company based in New Delhi, India, dedicated to analytical instruments. Blue Star remains the company’s Indian distributor but will concentrate on Electron Optics instruments.

In July, Life Technologies announced the opening of a regional distribution hub in Bangalore, India. It utilizes a hub-and-spoke model and spans 25,000 square feet. Order-fulfillment time has risen fourfold since the opening.

Pall announced in July a definitive agreement to acquire Engefiltro, its Brazilian distributor.

In July, Analytik Jena acquired a 20% stake in Westburg, its Dutch sales partner, for €150,000 ($212,000). Westburg specializes in molecular diagnostics.

For the first half, revenue for Roche Applied Science fell 16%, down 4% in local currency, to CHF 377 million ($416.6 million). Excluding year-over-year H1N1 effects, sales were flat. Custom Biotech sales grew 11%. Genomic Analysis sales declined 12%, qPCR and Nucleic Acid Purification sales fell 4%, and Other sales fell 9%. In local currency, North American sales rose 4% to 38% of sales. Sales in Europe/Middle East/Africa fell 9%, and Rest of World sales fell 7% to make up 40% and 22% of Applied Science sales, respectively.

Eppendorf appointed AITbiotech as a distributor for Singapore in July.

For the fiscal first quarter ending June 30, sales for Hitachi High-Technologies’ Science & Medical Systems unit fell 7.6% to ¥25,400 million ($311.4 million) (see IBO 7/31/11). Within the unit, sales of General-purpose Analytical Instruments rose 7.4% to ¥2,900 million ($35.6 million), sales of Electron Microscopes grew 52.8% to ¥5,500 million ($67.4 million), Clinical Analyzer sales fell 33.3% to ¥10,800 million ($132.4 million) and Biotechnology Products/Other grew 24.5% to ¥6,100 million ($74.8 million).

Mettler-Toledo’s second-quarter Lab sales increased 4% in local currency to make up 43% of company sales (see IBO 7/31/11).

In August, LECO announced the opening of its 3,500-square-foot European Life Sciences and Chemical Analysis Center in Mönchengladbach, Germany. The Center is dedicated to separation-science sales and applications.

In August, QIAGEN opened a subsidiary in Taipei, Taiwan, with 17 employees, and began direct sales. Since 2005, the company has expanded to 13 offices in Asia.

Agilent announced in August that the University of Western Australia’s Australian Research Center of Excellence in Plant Energy Biology will use its HPLC-Chip MS system, OpenLab Electronic Lab Notebook and Enterprise Content Manager for research to build the first plant protein–monitoring database. The project is part of a longer-term collaboration between Agilent and the University.