Healthineers to Buy Robotics Firm Corindus for $1.1 Billion
Healthineers to Buy Robotics Firm Corindus for $1.1 Billion
(Bloomberg) -- Siemens Healthineers AG plans to buy U.S. surgical firm Corindus Vascular Robotics Inc. for $1.1. billion, an acquisition aimed at broadening its portfolio of medical equipment beyond scanners.
Healthineers will pay $4.28 for each share in Waltham, Massachusetts-based Corindus, according to a statement Thursday. That’s 77% above Corindus’s last closing price. The deal is expected to close in the final quarter of 2019, and has the support of the Corindus board, the German company said.
The acquisition is aimed at convincing investors in Healthineers that the former unit of Siemens AG can grow beyond MRI and CT scanners, which form the bulk of earnings. Its Atellica platform, which combines various devices used to analyze blood tests, was already an attempt to do this and became the focus of the company’s growth pitch when it listed shares last year in an initial public offering.
Atellica ran into some problems after installations proved to be more difficult and costly than first thought. The company last week lowered its full-year target for the platform, and has reorganized the business in an effort to speed up shipments.
Corindus may now bolster Healthineers’ advanced therapies business, which focuses on imaging systems that aid surgeons in cardiovascular surgery. For the moment, advanced therapies is the smallest Healthineers division, making 65 million euros in profit in the last quarter. Corindus specializes in robotic systems that help guide catheters, wires and balloon or stent implants into veins with the help of imaging equipment Healthineers already makes.
Royal Philips NV has a 12.8% stake in Corindus and competes with Healthineers in the medical-scanner market. The Dutch company said Thursday it’s reviewing the deal and declined further comment.
“We are very mindful of the shareholder structure,” said Jochen Schmitz, chief financial officer of Healthineers. “This is to be a regular process between signing and closing, so we don’t see any particular problems, no interfering from Philips, but you never know.”
Healthineers shares fell 1% to 36.06 euros at 11:26 a.m. in Frankfurt. Corindus, set to report second-quarter earnings later Thursday, surged 75% in pre-market trading in New York to $4.23 per share.
“The acquisition appears to be a good fit,” RBC Europe analyst Wasi Rizvi wrote in a note. “The vascular interventions market is growing at about 20% a year.”
Healthineers Chief Executive Officer Bernd Montag said the acquisition would open up a new field for the company’s image-guided therapies business.
“We are creating significant synergies to advance therapy outcomes,” he said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Oliver Sachgau in Munich at osachgau@bloomberg.net;Ellen Proper in Amsterdam at eproper@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Palazzo at apalazzo@bloomberg.net, John Bowker, Marthe Fourcade
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