Sun Healthcare Group Inc., the Irvine company that plans to split itself into a nursing home operator and a real estate owner in the fourth quarter, got a “five-star” ranking in a recent article on investor website Motley Fool.
Sun is getting ready to spin off its real estate holdings as Sabra Health Care REIT Inc.
The move is designed to get some Wall Street recognition for Sun’s healthcare buildings, which the company contends are undervalued within its core nursing home business.
The article noted that members of one of Motley Fool’s investing groups are bullish on Sun.
They believe the company, which has yearly revenue of about $2 billion and more than 180 nursing homes and assisted living centers, eventually will outperform Standard & Poor’s 500 index.
Sun shares, which counted a recent market value of $545 million, are down about 9% since the start of 2010.
The S&P 500 is down 1% since the start of the year.
“Healthcare facilities offer an obvious play on the aging baby boomer demographic, and Sun Healthcare remains one of our community’s favorite ways to do it,” said Brian Pacampara, the article’s author.
Pacampara quoted a Motley Fool member who goes by “TMFDeej” and likes the plan to split off Sun’s real estate.
“One would think that the demand for nursing homes and assisted living facilities will only grow in the coming years as the baby boomers age,” TMFDeej said.
In August, Sun raised some $225 million from a stock offering and used the money to repay a portion of debt under its existing credit line as a prelude to the split.
Separately, Investopedia website also mentioned the Sun-Sabra split in an article about recent plans by companies to spin off businesses in an effort to increase shareholder value. The article noted that companies “are relying on spinoffs to boost stock price, something the market has refused to do.”
UCI Research
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine said they’ve decoded DNA with insights into the evolution of aging, development and fertility.
A team of UC Irvine researchers examined genes that came from what they called “sexually precocious” fruit flies.
The team found that there was evidence of evolution in more than 500 genes in the DNA of the fruit flies that could be linked to various traits such as size, sexual maturation and lifespan.
The findings contradict a long-held belief that sexual beings evolve the same way that simpler organisms, such as single-cell bacteria, do, according to UCI.
That discovery could alter the direction of genetic research for drugs and other products, researchers said.
The team pointed out that previous research found that humans and other mammals share 70% of the same genes as fruit flies.
Grants from UCI and the National Science Foundation funded the research. Findings appeared in the Sept. 15 online edition of Nature, a science journal.
Heart Valve Catheter
Irvine-based Edwards Lifesciences Corp. wasn’t the only Irvine-based heart valve maker that presented results at the Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics scientific meeting that just wrapped up in Washington, D.C. (see News of the Week, page 6).
CardiAQ Valve Technologies Inc., which makes a heart valve and catheter, said in a release that a first-phase clinical trial has shown that its system is able to “successfully and repeatedly deliver a mitral valve implant.”
The device maker plans to “shortly execute the next phases of pre-clinical testing in preparation for a first-in-man trial” in 2011, said Brent Ratz, CardiAQ’s chief executive.
CardiAQ, which was founded more than two years ago, operates from an 8,500-square-foot building that previously housed CoreValve Inc., a device maker that’s now part of Minnesota’s Medtronic Inc. The space was designed for a medical device company, including space for research, development and manufacturing.
Bits and Pieces
SafeShot Technologies LLC of Mission Viejo said it filed patents on what it called a “low-dose version” of its Epiphany single-use safety syringe … E. Alison Holman, a professor in the nursing science program at UCI, is one of 12 people who received a three-year, $350,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Holman plans to study the genetic effects of traumatic stress on cardiovascular disorders … BioCell Technology LLC of Newport Beach said a clinical study of a collagen supplement it’s developing to treat joint conditions associated with osteoarthritis showed that patients reported improvement of their conditions.
