LabCorp acquiring Raleigh-based LipoScience for $85.3M

Sept. 25--LabCorp has reached an agreement to acquire LipoScience, the Raleigh diagnostics company that has struggled since going public in early 2013, for $85.3 million.

Burlington-based LabCorp is paying $5.25 per share in cash to acquire the company. LipoScience's shares, which opened Thursday at $3.19, were up about 60 percent in trading this morning.

LipoScience's Board of Directors has unanimously approved the deal, which is expected to close in the fourth quarter. The company employed 180 people in August, including about 120 in Raleigh.

LipoScience makes a diagnostic tool that measures lipoprotein particles in the bloodstream that cause arterial plaque buildup and lead to heart disease. The company says its test is a direct measure of heart disease and therefore superior to the widely-used cholesterol test, which is only an estimate of heart disease risk.

The company's goal is to expand insurance coverage for the test, called LipoProfile, and to convince more doctors to adopt it. But LipoScience has faltered since going public at $9 a share in January 2013.

The company downgraded its financial forecast several times in the months after its IPO, saw several top executives depart, including its longtime CEO, and withdrew an application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for a new heart disease test.

Earlier this year the company laid off 22 employees and severed a contract with Health Diagnostic Laboratory, after the Richmond-based company put out a product to compete with LipoScience. LipoScience reported in August that its second-quarter sales fell and its net loss widened, largely because of the loss of the HDL contract.

LabCorp had annual revenues of $5.8 billion last year and has more than 34,000 employees worldwide. In a statement, LabCorp CEO David King said LipoScience will add to the company's portfolio of clinical support programs.

LabCorp is familiar with LipoScience, having used its diagnostic test as a way to check for heart disease.

Bracken: 919-829-4548; Twitter: @brackendavid

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