Interlace To Integrate With Hologic
While officials with Bedford-based medical device company Hologic were attending trade shows on new medical device technologies, they heard about a new product by a Framingham company, Interlace Medical, which had a lot of doctors excited.
The positive buzz prompted company officials to investigate Interlace and they soon realized the firm would be a good fit for Hologic's line of gynecological products, according to Shacey Petrovic, vice president of global surgical marketing at Hologic.
So Hologic - which posted $1.64 billion in revenues in 2009 - purchased Interlace Medical and its 50 or so employees for $125 million this month.
Now officials hope to fully integrate Interlace's business into Hologic's Marlborough offices. Hologic also plans to market and sell Interlace's product, which just recently won government approval.
Venture capitalist investors in Interlace say they're happy with the deal and say it's recognition that the startup's product is a positive addition to the medical device field.
Safe, Fast, Effective
Interlace's MyoSure is a less-invasive gynecological product for the estimated 5 million females who suffer from symptomatic fibroids or polyps, which can cause excessive bleeding. Past therapies have required hysterectomies, but Interlace developed a new treatment that can save a woman's reproductive organs.
"There was a real medical need for a way to remove these fibroids that was fast, safe and effective," said Albert L. Wiegman II, who is a partner with HLM Venture Partners in Boston, one of the Interlace investors. "The company really did a great job in identifying the need and developing a product for it."
MyoSure treats women in a matter of minutes and with just local anesthesia. Also, unlike other treatments that jeopardize a woman's child-bearing ability, MyoSure protects the reproductive organs, making it ideal for younger women.
Interlace will be folded into Hologic's GYN surgical products division, which is headquartered at 250 Locke Dr. in Marlborough. Over the next year, Interlace employees will be moved to the Marlborough location and eventually Interlace's Framingham office at 135 Newbury St. will close.
Petrovic, with Hologic, said all of the remaining employees that were with Interlace before the purchase will be absorbed by Hologic. Interlace did cut some employees, though Petrovic would not say how many, directly before the sale was announced.
Interlace was founded in 2006 and received venture capital in each of the past three years before gaining U.S. Food & Drug Administration approval in August 2009.
Interlace also recently received a $75,000-tax incentive from the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center after agreeing to create 10 jobs in 2011. Hologic officials will either have to commit to creating the jobs now that Interlace is a part of the company, or they will not receive the tax break, according to Angus McQuilken, spokesperson for the Waltham-based Life Sciences Center, which manages tax incentives for the industry.
Wiegman, the Interlace board member, said he's hopeful the $125 million deal, which includes some performance payments, is a good sign for what's to come in 2011 in the exit market for startups.
There has been a slowdown in initial public offering and merger and acquisition activity during the past few years, which have traditionally been the ways that venture capitalists turn a profit on their investments, or exit. There is a lot of money "on the sidelines," Wiegman said, but many buyers are waiting for companies that have received FDA approval before pulling the trigger on a purchase.
Still, big medical device and technology companies are looking to make strategic investments, said Milton McColl, a member of the Interlace board of directors and a partner with New Leaf Venture Partners in California. That's why the Interlace-Hologic deal was a good one.
"Interlace really has a great technology, and now they have a great partner," McColl said. "It's a deal that makes sense for both parties."
Hologic still has struggles of its own, however. The company reported a loss of $62.8 million on revenue of $1.68 billion in the last fiscal year. For the prior year, the company lost $2.2 billion on revenue of $1.64 billion.
WBJ Web Partners
Most Recent
Most Recent
0 Comments