Waters Corporation Announces Acquisition of Creon Lab Control
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| Waters to Offer Total Lab Informatics Suite with Complementary Technologies
Milford, MA, – July 30, 2003 – Waters Corporation announced today it has successfully completed the acquisition of Creon Lab Control (CLC) of Cologne, Germany for approximately $16 million. CLC has been a privately held company with a legacy specializing in Laboratory Information Management Software (LIMS) solutions and expected 2003 sales of approximately $10 million. This acquisition is expected to have no material impact on Waters earnings for 2003. Most recently, CLC has introduced the Q-DIS/DRAGON™ products for Electronic Lab Notebooks (ELN) and the Q-DIS/PANDA™ products for Laboratory Data Management Software (LDMS). Waters sees the ELN and LDMS applications as complementary technologies that when integrated with Waters Empower™ Chromatography Software and MassLynx 4.0 Software applications provide the basis for a total lab informatics solution from one vendor—Waters. “The acquisition of CLC provides Waters with a broader portfolio of technology and products to help users manage lab information,” said Art Caputo, President of the Waters Division of Waters Corporation. “We have taken a major step in strengthening our position as the partner of choice for the analytical marketplace. CLC’s products will extend Waters market-leading position in data management software to deliver the most comprehensive and integrated solutions for today’s labs.” As the analytical market generates huge volumes of data, customers are challenged not just generating and processing this data but mining it appropriately, as well as presenting consolidated information to management and regulatory agencies. The synergy between Waters robust tools and CLC’s inventive products benefits scientists challenged with acquiring, analyzing, managing and distributing HPLC, MS and other relevant data. Bringing these two companies together enables scientists to have powerful and consistent tools in a lab environment.” “We see the combination of Waters and CLC innovative software solutions as advantageous to us,” stated Dr. Ruediger Iden, Senior Vice President of Research at BASF. “As we leverage our relationship with CLC, with the power of Waters behind them now, confirms we are working with a leading lab informatics solutions provider.” Moving forward, CLC will continue to offer their products and services to the marketplace while tightening their field sales association with Waters worldwide sales force. Development integration will continue to improve as both teams work to provide seamless access to laboratory information from wherever the user is located. About Waters Corporation (www.waters.com), Empower Chromatography Software, MassLynx Software, Q-DIS/DRAGON, Q-DIS/PANDA Waters Corporation (NYSE:WAT) is a world leader in analytical instrumentation, chemistries, and support services with fiscal year 2002 revenues of $890 million and more than 3,500 employees. Introduced in March of 2002, Empower Software is Waters flagship chromatography product. Empower Software represents a fundamental shift in chromatography data system (CDS) usability by replacing cumbersome add-ins (i.e., system components that provide added functionality through distinct installations) to a more scaleable switch-on approach. MassLynx Software is Waters mass spectroscopy informatics suite providing scientists with the fundamental data platform for acquiring, analyzing, managing and distributing mass spectrometry information. Featuring intelligent instrument control and the ability to acquire nominal mass, exact mass, MS/MS and exact mass MS/MS data, MassLynx Software offers the versatility required in today’s labs. Q-DIS/DRAGON is the innovative generic electronic laboratory notebook for all workplaces in an analytical organization: from chemical, pharmaceutical to biological research as well as for routine work. Q-DIS/DRAGON facilitates centralized or distributed long-term storage of knowledge independent of language or type of information. It provides functionality according to rules of good laboratory notebook practices and provides a robust user interface to data, information, knowledge management, and logistics systems. Q-DIS/PANDA is a platform-independent, easy to use, 100% web-based central storage system that collects all types of formerly scattered information as an electronic record to generate a knowledge-based archive. The data stored are accessible by relevant persons at various locations throughout the organization. Contact: Brian J. Murphy Waters, Empower, MassLynx, Q-DIS/DRAGON, and Q-DIS/PANDA are trademarks of the Waters Corporation. CAUTIONARY STATEMENT This release contains “forward-looking” statements regarding future results and events, including statements regarding expected financial results, future growth and customer demand that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. For this purpose, any statements contained herein that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed forward looking statements. Without limiting the foregoing, the words, “believes”, “anticipates”, “plans”, “expects”, “intends”, “appears”, “estimates”, “projects”, and similar expressions are intended to identify forward looking statements. The Company’s actual future results may differ significantly from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements within this release for a variety of reasons including and without limitation: loss of market share through competition, introduction of competing products by other companies, pressures on prices from competitors and/or customers, regulatory obstacles to new product introductions, lack of acceptance of new products, changes in the demands of the Company’s healthcare and pharmaceutical company customers, changes in the healthcare market and the pharmaceutical industry, changes in distribution of the Company’s products, the short-term effect on sales and expenses as a result of the formerly announced combination of the Waters and Micromass sales, service and distribution organizations, and foreign exchange fluctuations. Such factors and others are discussed more fully in the section entitled “Risk Factors” of the Company’s Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2002, as filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which “Risk Factors” discussion is incorporated by reference in this press release. The forward-looking statements included in this press release represent the Company’s estimates as of the date of this press release and should not be relied upon as representing the Company’s estimates or views as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release. The Company specifically disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements in the future. About CREON·LAB·CONTROL AG CREON·LAB·CONTROL is the leading application platform provider for the chemical, pharmaceutical and life science industry, covering the whole field of scientific knowledge handling. This includes data management at the point of collection, evaluation, interlinking, archiving and retrieval of information to documentation for R&D and quality management organizations. CREON·LAB·CONTROL is the result of a powerful merger of the leading IT specialists Creon Software and LabControl in 2000. Together, the company represents about twenty years of experience in the field of chem- and bioinformatics. CREON·LAB·CONTROL is an internationally operating organization and most staff holds degrees and further degrees in both computer and natural sciences. This expertise flows into the development of tailored IT solutions and services for our respective customers. The Q-DIS Corporate Backbone is the technology CREON·LAB·CONTROL provides to enable organizations to easy build up an infrastructure for a lot of common tasks in a pharmaceutical, biotech or chemical oriented company. It delivers single infrastructure for: Laboratory Information Management (LIMS), Electronic Lab Notebooks, Electronic Record Management, Analytical Workflow, Automatic Dereplication, Automatic Structure Validation, Distribution of Scientific Information, Distribution of SOP’s, Analytical productivity tools and Stereoselective Substructure Search. At CREON·LAB·CONTROL products are developed in cooperation with high profile industry partners. Teamwork like this sets standards in the area of software technology from which everyone benefits. For more information please visit our homepage |
