Thermo Fisher Scientific to acquire Dionex

Thermo Fisher Scientific has announced that it will acquire all of the outstanding shares of Dionex Corporation for a total purchase price of approximately $2.1 billion. The transaction is not conditioned on financing and is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2011. Dionex will be integrated into Thermo Fisher’s Analytical Technologies segment.

Marc N Casper, President and CEO of Thermo Fisher, said, “Dionex’s strength in chromatography instruments, software and consumables complements our leading positions in mass spectrometry and laboratory information management systems. The transaction, which we expect to be immediately accretive, is consistent with our strategy of accelerating growth by increasing our depth of capabilities to serve attractive end markets. Specifically, it complements our strong presence in China, where we’ve established the headquarters for our global environmental instruments business and continue to build our commercial infrastructure to meet the needs of customers in growing water quality, consumer safety and life sciences markets.”

Dionex’s chromatography data system combined with Thermo Fisher’s enterprise laboratory information management systems will create the most comprehensive desktop and enterprise software capabilities in the industry. A further benefit of the acquisition will be the expansion of the Thermo Fisher presence in applied markets including environmental analysis, food safety and other industrial sectors, allowing it to provide analytical solutions for growing testing needs such as water analysis.

The acquisition will also increase the company's footprint in Asian markets such as China and India as well as other strategic growth markets like Brazil.