Technology product investor Roper Industries is spending a combined $450 million on two products to expand its software offerings, according to a company release.
The Sarasota-Fla.-based company is acquiring Data Innovations, which produces middleware, or software that facilitates communication between laboratory instruments and other software. Roper also announced its acquisition of Softwriters, a software producer for long-term-care pharmacies.
Data Innovations will become a subsidiary of Roper's Sunquest Information Systems in Tucson, Ariz., which produces diagnostic lab software. Data Innovations was a portfolio company of Battery Ventures, a Boston venture capital firm.
Data Innovations' middleware works in the background to connect instruments like microscopes, centrifuges and sequencers to lab software produced by companies like Sunquest. The company's middleware also is sold to electronic health record manufacturers to facilitate interoperability between labs and physicians.
Sunquest was attracted to Data Innovations because of its client base, which includes lab-equipment companies like Roche, Abbott Laboratories and Beckman Coulter, said Sunquest's President, Matthew Hawkins. Data Innovations is also known in the industry for offering some of the most sophisticated middleware on the market, he said.
“It starts with our fundamental belief that integrated diagnostics drive revenue, increase revenue opportunity for our clients, and drive efficiency and accurate results,” Hawkins said.
Data Innovation's brand will be retained in the deal, and the company will continue to operate from its Burlington, Vt. headquarters.
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