We saw acquisitions, partnerships, and financings from tech and life sciences firms in New England this week.
—Bloomberg News reported that Thermo Fisher Scientific (NYSE: [[ticker:TMO]]), a Waltham, MA-based provider of lab instruments and services, planned to sell two lab test units for a total of up to $1 billion. Those businesses include Athena Diagnostics of Worcester, MA, and Lancaster Labs of Lancaster, PA.
—Bedford, MA-based Ocular Therapeutix bumped its Series C funding round up to $21 million, with a new $6 million investment. Polaris Venture Partners led the previous close of this financing for Ocular, which was previously called I-Therapeutix and is developing hydrogel technology for protecting the eye after ophthalmic surgeries and for delivering drugs to the eye.
—Akorri Networks of Littleton, MA, was bought by Sunnyvale, CA-based NetApp (NASDAQ: [[ticker:NTAP]]) in an all-cash deal. NetApp didn’t reveal how much it paid for Akorri, a provider of analytical software for data management.
—Lebanon, NH-based Mascoma, a developer of technology for producing cellulosic ethanol, inked a deal with Valero Energy that could be worth up to $50 million. The oil firm entered a non-binding agreement to fund construction of a Mascoma refinery in Michigan that would use wood-based materials to make ethanol.
—IT firm Mercury Computer Systems of Chelmsford, MA, announced it had purchased Salem, NH-based LNX, a provider of receiver systems for intelligence technology, for $31 million in cash. LNX could get an additional $5 million from Mercury (NASDAQ: [[ticker:MRCY]]) for hitting certain financial targets in 2011 and 2012, according to the announcement.
—Needham, MA-based e-mail archiving firm Sonian nabbed a $9 million Series B investment from new strategic partners Amazon.com and Webroot Software and existing investors Summerhill Venture Partners and Prism VentureWorks. Sonian uses Amazon’s Internet cloud technology to store corporate e-mail communication.
—GlassHouse Technologies, a Framingham, MA-based IT firm that registered for an initial public offering last year worth up to $75 million, wrapped up a $5 million investment from Citrix Systems in a Series F preferred stock offering. GlassHouse also gave Citrix (NASDAQ: [[ticker:CTXS]]), an IT virtualization technology developer, an observer seat on its board of directors and agreed to notify the company of any offers to buy GlassHouse.
