'We're hiring,' says CardioNet CEO after buying rival: UPDATE
Wireless heart-arrhythmia monitor maker CardioNet Inc., Conshohocken, says it's agreed to pay $4.82 per share, or around $14 million, for "event monitor" maker Biotel Inc., Eagan, Minnesota
UPDATE with CEO interview: Why Biotel? "They have some advanced wireless diagnostic technology" that expands CardioNet's product line, chief executive Randy Thurman told me. Agility develops and sells heart-monitoring systems to medical device and drug makers. The deal is part of a previously-announced CardioNet expansion strategy, and will boost earnings starting next year, according to Thurman.
"We're one of the few companies that's hiring," Thurman said. "We're doubling our sales force this year." The deal also includes Biotel's wholly-owned subsidiary, Chicago-based Agility Centralized Research Services, which arranges monitor testing for clients including Medtronic and other biotech and pharma companies. Biotel employs around 50, according to its last annual report.
CardioNet employs around 800 -- 440 in Conshy, 40 more in Chester, plus the tech center in San Diego, offices in Florida and Georgia -- and is traded under the symbol BEAT on the Nasdaq stock market. The company went public at $17.70 a year ago, traded at $28.12 just after noon (up 67 cents), boosted sales from $2 million a month up to $3 million a month during 2008, and has reported profits in the last three quarters. Thurman, a former president of Rhone-Poulenc-Rorer, previously founded (2000) Viasys Healthcare, a medical equipment maker, and ran it til it was bought by Cardinal Health for more than $1.5 billion last year.