Cytognos divestment is a first strategic step aimed at positioning Vitro as a new worldwide diagnostic player in their key market segments
Vitro S.A, a privately held company headquartered in Seville, Spain, announced today the sale of Cytognos to Becton Dickinson and Company (BD). Cytognos is a company specializing in flow cytometry solutions for blood cancer diagnosis, minimal residual disease (MRD) detection, and immune monitoring research for hematological diseases. Cytognos’ employees joining BD as a result of the acquisition will continue to support employment stability in the Salamanca area in Spain. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Vitro has been a long-term investor in Cytognos since 1996, taking a majority stake in the company in 2018 to create a full platform player that integrates and commercializes flow cytometry reagents, hardware and software. This add-on investment was Vitro’s first since GED Capital’s majority investment in Vitro in June 2017. Cytognos has since evolved into a full platform player in the clinical flow cytometry market.
“This major transaction with such a leading global IVD company highlights Vitro as a sophisticated niche technology player, and it will be followed with additional corporate and key technology achievements related to our molecular biology and anatomic pathology platforms”
Javier Fernandez, Vitro’s CEO.
Vitro has approximately 250 employees at their facilities in Seville, Granada, Madrid, Valencia and Lisbon, with a new branch in Istanbul to be launched in February. The company boasts remarkable capabilities in the development of reagents, software and hardware, and their integration into proprietary full diagnostic platforms. With its own anatomic pathology and molecular biology reference laboratory, Vitro is able to validate and benchmark new reagents faster and more efficiently than its key competitors. With this divestment, Vitro will be able to focus its resources on the launch of its new, first-in-class in vitro diagnostics platforms in 2022. The company is in the process of setting up independent units to manage its existing reagents, hardware and software diagnostic teams, which focus on molecular biology, anatomic pathology, and Women’s Health D2C services.
Lazard acted as the exclusive financial advisor, and Garrigues acted as legal counsel to Vitro. KPMG provided financial due diligence support and LEK provided commercial due diligence support.
