BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company), through its BD Biosciences segment, has acquired Atto Bioscience Inc in a cash transaction valued at approximately $25 million. Atto Bioscience, Inc reported sales of $3 million for calendar year 2003 and is expected to double its sales for calendar year 2004, a BD company release said.

"The acquisition of Atto Bioscience is part of our strategy to expand our presence in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology market, as well as to enhance our presence in the life sciences academic and government research markets," said Vincent A Forlenza, president, BD Biosciences by adding, "This transaction will unite Atto Bioscience's high content imaging platforms with BD Biosciences' leading flow cytometry platforms and wide range of cell-based assay tools, positioning BD to play a leading role in the emerging high content cell analysis market."

Since its inception, Atto Bioscience has developed novel technologies for investigating biochemical and physiological changes in living cells in real time, which have important implications for the future of drug discovery. BD Biosciences will work to leverage these technologies to help researchers identify drug-related effects on a sub-population of cells and to optimize high efficacy drug candidates at earlier stages of the drug discovery process, the release says.

"BD Biosciences' proven expertise in commercializing cell analysis instrumentation and innovative reagents fit perfectly with our core expertise of providing live-cell analysis technologies to the life sciences market," said Atto Bioscience president and CEO Derek Woods. "Joining the BD family will allow us to better deliver and support our already well accepted technologies globally," he added.

BD is a medical technology company that serves healthcare institutions, life science researchers, clinical laboratories, industry, and the general public. BD manufactures and sells a broad range of medical supplies, devices, laboratory equipment, and diagnostic products. For the fiscal year ended September 30, 2003, BD reported total revenues of $4.528 billion.