Life Technologies Acquires BAC BV, Expands Capabilities in Bioprocessing

CARLSBAD, Calif., Jan. 22, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Life Technologies Corporation (NASDAQ: LIFE) today announced its acquisition of BAC BV, a privately held company based in the Netherlands, and a leader in the discovery, development and manufacture of protein purification products. The acquisition expands Life's capabilities and product offerings in the growing market of biopharmaceutical research and manufacturing.

"Our acquisition of BAC BV positions Life Technologies as a leading provider of end-to-end solutions that are widely utilized in the bioprocess workflow," said Tony Hunt, head of BioProduction at Life Technologies. "Combining BAC's current portfolio and pipeline with our pre-existing portfolio expands Life's product offering and enables us to compete more fully across the protein purification market. We intend to immediately integrate the portfolios and leverage the Life commercial platform to drive accelerated growth in this market."

Bioprocessing is the production and analytical testing of biologically-based therapeutics, which are developed in cultured cells or microorganisms, and include drugs, vaccines, biosimilars, and gene and cell therapies. Life Technologies' Gibco® brand is the market leader in cell culture media, a position it has held for 50 years, and the company more recently integrated its POROS® brand of chromatography resins for purification of therapeutic products into the Bioproduction portfolio.

The acquisition expands Life's existing portfolio by adding BAC BV's unique set of innovative and proprietary affinity ligands to the company's world-class POROS® resins. Affinity ligands are molecules capable of binding with very high affinity to specific proteins, and are typically attached to chromatography resins in a production-scale, bio-purification process.

Life customers will benefit from a streamlined approach to protein purification with tailored end-to-end solutions. In addition to Gibco® culture media, POROS® resins and the BAC BV affinity ligand portfolio for protein purification, Life also offers the Applied Biosystems® SEQ rapid molecular kits for contaminant and impurity testing of bio-therapeutic products.  

"We are looking forward to developing and providing unique, enabling products from our combined portfolios and capabilities to our purification customers," said Laurens Sierkstra, Ph.D., chief executive officer of BAC BV. Sierkstra and an additional 34 employees will join Life Technologies. Current BAC BV facilities, a manufacturing site in Naarden and R&D facility in Leiden, Netherlands, will remain in operation. 

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The tuck-in acquisition of BAC BV is expected to be neutral to the company's overall ROIC three years after close.

About Life Technologies
Life Technologies Corporation (NASDAQ: LIFE) is a global biotechnology company with customers in more than 160 countries using its innovative solutions to solve some of today's most difficult scientific challenges. Quality and innovation are accessible to every lab with its reliable and easy-to-use solutions spanning the biological spectrum, with more than 50,000 products for agricultural biotechnology, translational research, molecular medicine and diagnostics, stem cell-based therapies, forensics, food safety and animal health. Its systems, reagents and consumables represent some of the most cited brands in scientific research including: Ion Torrent™, Applied Biosystems®, Invitrogen™, Gibco®, Ambion®, Molecular Probes® and Novex®. Life Technologies employs approximately 10,400 people and upholds its ongoing commitment to innovation with more than 4,000 patents and exclusive licenses. LIFE had sales of $3.7 billion in 2011. Visit us at our website: http://www.lifetechnologies.com.

Life Technologies' Safe Harbor Statement
This press release includes forward-looking statements about Life Technologies' anticipated results that involve risks and uncertainties. Some of the information contained in this press release, including, but not limited to, statements as to industry trends and Life Technologies' plans, objectives, expectations and strategy for its business, contains forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Any statements that are not statements of historical fact are forward-looking statements. When used, the words "believe," "plan," "intend," "anticipate," "target," "estimate," "expect" and the like, and/or future tense or conditional constructions ("will," "may," "could," "should," etc.), or similar expressions, identify certain of these forward-looking statements. Important factors which could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements are detailed in filings made by Life Technologies with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Life Technologies undertakes no obligation to update or revise any such forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.

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Life Technologies Contact
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SOURCE Life Technologies Corporation