NimbleGen will be integrated into the Roche’s diagnostics division, and the company’s 140 employees will be retained, Roche said. NimbleGen will be further expanding its product portfolio in the near future to include higher density arrays, integrated instrument systems, and related reagents and consumables for advanced genome analysis.
Worldwide, the micro array systems market has a size of about $600 million and showed 10% growth in 2006. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2007, subject to approval by NimbleGen’s shareholders and regulatory clearance.
Severin Schwan, CEO of Roche Diagnostics, said: “The Array Systems from NimbleGen are highly synergistic and will complement the existing Roche portfolio of innovative genomic research tools such as the LightCycler qPCR systems and the high-throughput Sequencing Systems from the recently acquired company 454 Life Sciences.”