Pressure BioSciences signs distribution deal for Germany and Switzerland

Pressure BioSciences (NASDAQ:PBIO) said Monday it has inked a distribution agreement with Germany-based scientific product provider IUL Instruments.

The deal gives IUL the exclusive right to market and sell the company's pressure cycling technology (PCT) sample preparation instruments and consumables in Germany and Switzerland.

Pressure BioSciences' key product, the Barocycler, is an instrument that uses rapid and repeating cycles of hydrostatic pressure at controlled temperatures, in order to extract cell components in preparing a biological sample, for further study. Biological samples could include DNA, RNA, proteins, and lipids from humans, animals, and plants.

The PBI sample preparation system has been proven to be safer, more accurate, reproducible, and much faster than current cell extraction methods - with up to 48 samples able to be processed from a wide variety of cells and tissues within minutes.

Since the company began commercial operations in the middle of 2007, it has come a long way, releasing a number of PCT-based products geared towards the $6 billion sample preparation market, including three pressure-generating Barocyclers, a patent-pending sample homogenization device (The Shredder SG3), five types of single-use processing containers and six different, application-specific reagent kits.

In addition to the terms set out above under the distribution deal, IUL will also have the non-exclusive right to market and sell Pressure BioSciences' recently-released Shredder SG3, and its associated consumables, in the same two countries of Germany and Switzerland.

President and CEO of Pressure BioSciences, Richard T. Schumacher, said: “IUL’s customers include thousands of researchers in biotechnology, pharmaceutical, government, and academic laboratories. IUL is a well-respected, value-added distributor offering a wide assortment of laboratory products.

"They have over thirty highly trained marketing, sales and service personnel, many with advanced degrees in the life sciences. They also have a well-designed infrastructure to support their large customer base.

"We are very excited to partner with IUL and look forward to working closely with them as they introduce the PCT Platform and related products to their existing and extensive customer base.”

Already, the company has installed around 200 of its PCT Barocycler instruments plus required consumables in laboratories. The applications range from the key $2 billion target market of mass spectrometry - an analytical technique used to determine the characteristics of molecules - to biomarker discovery, forensics and counter-bioterrorism, among other uses.

According to recent market reports, the company believes there are roughly 80,000 laboratories around the world that require the extraction of DNA, RNA, proteins, lipids and small molecules from biological samples for their research studies.  Pressure BioSciences aims to capture between 5 to 10 percent of this existing market in the next three to five years, amounting to roughly between 4,000 to 8,000 labs. This should mean big business considering Barocycler instruments cost between $25,000 to $48,000 per unit, and with every Barocycler sale, there is an expected stream of consumable sales for years afterwards.

President of IUL, Alexander Beljaars,  commented: “We understand well the German and Swiss life sciences market, including the need for high quality sample preparation products. We believe that PBI’s PCT Sample Preparation System is unique to the market, has been proven to be very effective by leading scientists in US laboratories over the past few years, and will fill a very important yet unmet need in our customer base."

"We are excited to have the opportunity to introduce PCT, the PCT SPS, and the Shredder SG3 System to our customers, and believe we will be successful in marketing these state-of-the-art sample preparation products to the German and Swiss life sciences marketplace.”

Pressure BioSciences' revenue in the third quarter was 50 percent greater than revenue in either the first or second quarters of the year. Indeed, its PCT products revenue in the third quarter was the highest it has been in a year.

Sales so far for the company have been achieved with a sales team of just three. But earlier this month, the company managed to raise $843,000 from a registered direct offering, which will be used to further boost commercialization efforts. Schumacher said it has a specific commercialization strategy in place, which includes both internal sales and external partnerships - a strategy that is expected to be implemented into 2012.

In a recent research report by Zacks, the company was praised for having made "great progress" in 2011, as it received grants of $161,000 from the National Institutes of Health to help develop a new method for the processing of cancer and other samples, and a grant from the US Defense Department for $750,000 to help develop a new PCT-based instrument for high throughput processing.

Germany-based IUL, with a staff of more than 30, specializes in providing scientific products in microbiology, cell biology, and biotech applications and offers support of specialized technologies, including sample preparation.