By Paul Sandle <\/p>\n
LONDON (Reuters) - British pharmaceutical company BTG announced two deals on Thursday that it said could create an interventional medicine business with potential sales of $1 billion. <\/p>\n
Chief Executive Louise Makin told Reuters the deals would more than double BTG's revenues in the fast-growing market of targeting specific areas rather than administering drugs to the whole body. <\/p>\n
BTG added to its liver cancer treatments by agreeing to buy the targeted therapies division of Nordion Inc for about $200 million, adding Therasphere radioactive glass beads to its chemotherapy beads unit. <\/p>\n
It is also buying EKOS Corp for an initial $180 million, plus up to $40 million in future payments, to gain a treatment for severe blood clots, which can be fatal if they cause a pulmonary embolism. <\/p>\n
Some of the cost of buying the Nordion unit will come from the placing of 32.8 million new shares, representing just under 10 percent of BTG's share capital, BTG said. <\/p>\n
\"Together we can see we are going to have the potential to build a $1 billion business,\" Makin said in an interview on Thursday. \"We are going to have the important products for the vascular surgeons, the interventional radiologists and the interventional cardiologists.\" <\/p>\n
Shares in the group were trading 0.2 percent lower at 338 pence by 11:49 GMT, outperforming a 2.2 percent weaker mid-cap index. <\/p>\n
Analysts Savvas Neophytou at Panmure Gordon and Peel Hunt's Paul Cuddon both upgraded BTG to \"buy\" from \"hold\" on the back of the deals. <\/p>\n
Cuddon said he did not expect the acquisitions to boost earnings in the next two years but in the longer term they could make BTG \"a more compelling M&A target with critical mass in interventional medicine.\" <\/p>\n
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BTG says interventional medicine buys could boost sales to $1 bln<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Paul Sandle LONDON (Reuters) - British pharmaceutical company BTG announced two deals on Thursday that it said could create an interventional medicine business with potential sales of $1 billion. Continue reading