Zila Transitions to Cancer Detection Company
Posted: December 7, 2006
Zila, Inc. (NASDAQ GM: ZILA), has completed the acquisition of Professional Dental Technologies, Inc. ("Pro-Dentec®") a privately-held, profitable dental products company headquartered in Arkansas, in a $34 million cash transaction. Pro-Dentec generates annual revenue of approximately $35 million and EBITDA of approximately $5 million.
"With the acquisition of Pro-Dentec, we have completed a remarkable transformation of Zila into a cancer detection company. Pro-Dentec provides us the means to distribute our oral cancer detection products directly to dental professionals through a highly-regarded national sales force that is already profitably selling complementary Soft Tissue Management (STM®) products; oral cancer is a life threatening soft tissue disease. Pro-Dentec's national sales, marketing and distribution capability provides the infrastructure required to establish our oral cancer detection products as the standard of care in dental offices nationally," stated Douglas D. Burkett, Ph.D., Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President of Zila, Inc.
Pro-Dentec conducts approximately 115 continuing education seminars for dentists and their staffs each year that are certified by the American Dental Association and the Academy of General Dentistry. These seminars are ideally suited to train a large number of dental professionals on the importance of oral cancer screening. Zila believes that its new national sales and marketing force will enable the rapid growth of ViziLite Plus and, following FDA approval, OraTest.
"According to the American Cancer Society, the incidence of oral cancer has grown while other major cancers have decreased. Pro-Dentec has the capability to reach most of the nation's dentists and has well-established, ongoing relationships with a large number of dental offices. The screening of at-risk patients with ViziLite Plus at dental offices within Pro-Dentec's existing customer base will provide enormous growth for Zila while saving lives," stated Dr. Frank Bellizzi, President of Zila Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
To facilitate the acquisition of Pro-Dentec, the Company completed two tranches of a $40 million Private Placement of equity and debt through its financial advisor and placement agent, Roth Capital Partners, with the final $16 million tranche for future working capital scheduled to fund today.
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