ICU Medical Inc., a San Clemente-based medical device maker, is getting ready to release a new product widely that it says could help stop drug contamination.
The company’s Diana needle-free, user-controlled automated device for reconstituting and preparing hazardous drugs is set for full U.S. rollout during the annual meeting of the American Society of Health System Pharmacists this week in Las Vegas.
ICU says that Diana could help ensure the sterility of drugs during the compounding process, which garnered headlines in late October after an incident involving a meningitis outbreak that resulted in more than 30 patient deaths and 460-plus infections associated with custom-made drugs from the New England Compounding Center in Framingham, Mass.
The company said that Diana’s components are microbiologically and mechanically closed, which could ensure the safety of a drug throughout the compounding process.
“We designed Diana so that nothing can escape from the system to endanger a clinician, but as a completely closed system, nothing should be able to enter the system to contaminate the drug, either,” ICU Chief Executive George Lopez said in a release.
Diana’s creation came about after Lopez’s wife, Diana Lopez, died from cancer in 2006. Diana asked her husband to create a device to keep patients and caregivers safe from exposure to chemotherapy drugs after hearing health complaints from her nurses while she was receiving treatment.
Diana has been available in Europe for more than a year.
ICU makes needleless intravenous connectors and other types of devices, including ones that protect healthcare workers from chemotherapy drugs that can be toxic. It has annual sales of about $300 million, no debt and a recent market value of $860 million.
Meantime, ICU is considered something of a takeover target these days.
The Seeking Alpha investor website recently identified possible ICU suitors as Franklin Lake, N.J.-based Becton Dickinson & Co., Chicago-based Baxter International Inc. and Covidien PLC, which is based in Ireland and operates from Massachusetts. Baxter, Covidien and Becton all have Orange County locations.
“All three of these companies have sufficient cash to cover the cost of acquiring [ICU],” site analyst David Zanoni wrote.
Becton Dickinson had $2.19 billion in cash.
Baxter had $3.19 billion, and Covidien had $1.94 billion as of Sept. 30.
ICU has worked to diversify itself in recent years, though Lake Forest, Ill.-based Hospira Inc. still accounted for 41% of the company’s revenue through the first nine months of this year. The company also sells to other device makers and independent distributors, as well as directly.
Demographics also favor ICU Medical because the need for the device maker’s products will go up as the health of large numbers of senior citizens begins to deteriorate, according to Zanoni.
Allergan Note
A week ago, we took a look at Irvine drug maker Allergan Inc.’s pending $350 million buy of Carlsbad-based SkinMedica Inc.’s skin-care business and how it could boost its facial-aesthetics business unit.
Wall Street is also taking notice.
Analyst Annabel Samimy of St. Louis-based Stifel, Nicolaus & Co. called SkinMedica a “rapidly emerging leader in aesthetic skin care” and noted it targeted the doctor-dispensed market in a research note issued after Allergan’s mid-November deal announcement.
Allergan, with SkinMedica in its fold, “adds to its already established aesthetics business and expands its physician-dispensed offerings to be sold through a combined SkinMedica sales force,” Samimy said.
SkinMedica has launched five new products in the past four years, including flagship TNS Essential Serum, which goes for $260 a bottle at retail, according to Samimy.
“Importantly, its target audience is in-line with Allergan’s consumer base, with high incomes spending $2,000 [or more] annually on SkinMedica products,” she said.
Samimy also praised SkinMedica’s research and development efforts in her note. She said the company’s pipeline “promises multiple releases” in 2013, such as a treatment for hyperpigmentation and acne.
SkinMedica also has ongoing research projects in tanning, hair, aging and pigmentation as well, she wrote.
Quality’s New Software
Irvine-based healthcare software maker Quality Systems Inc. launched its new 8 Series electronic health record content software. Quality said the new software features automated outcomes reporting, enhanced disease management workflows, and precise content for more than 25 medical specialties.
