Diagnostic company Inverness Medical Innovations’ (Waltham, Massachusetts) 2007 buying spree didn’t stop when the ceremonial ball dropped in Times Square on New Year’s Eve.

Inverness, which bought eight companies last year, said Monday it has agreed to acquire Matria Healthcare (Marietta, Georgia) for $39 a share – $6.50 in cash plus $32.50 in convertible preferred stock of Inverness.

The deal is worth $1.18 billion, including the assumption of $280 million in debt.

Matria shareholders must approve the transaction, which is expected to close in 2Q08. The company provides health enhancement, disease management and high-risk pregnancy management programs and services.

“We view the acquisition of Matria as an important part of our overall health management growth strategy,” said Ron Zwanziger, CEO of Inverness. “In addition to Matria’s substantial position in the disease management, productivity enhancement and informatics markets, Matria brings specialized expertise in women’s health, which will complement our rapid diagnostics in that area.”

Inverness said it plans to consolidate Matria with its recently acquired Alere (Reno, Nevada) and Paradigm (Upper Saddle River, New Jersey) businesses to form a combined organization that focuses on the health management market.

Inverness acquired Alere last year for $302 million, consisting of about $125 million in cash and $177 million in Inverness stock. And in late December the company completed its acquisition of Paradigm, a provider of support technologies and expert coaching to facilitate better health choices for acutely ill and clinically complex patients, including neonatal intensive care and oncology patients. That transaction was structured as an all-cash deal for about $230 million.

“We’ve already made tremendous progress integrating the management and operations of Alere and Paradigm,” Ronald Geraty, MD, CEO of Alere, said during Inverness’ conference call Monday to discuss the acquisition. “Similarly, we will begin the integration of Alere with Matria immediately after the close.”

Geraty told listeners, “This is a transformative acquisition for Inverness’ health management business.” Expanding the business from about 100,000 patients to more than a million patients with the addition of Matria’s business is a “significant expansion,” he noted.

Matria has “run into some challenges” with the integration of core solutions and with some of its key clients, he said, adding that Inverness looked into both issues “very, very carefully,” as part of its due diligence.

“We’re confident that we’ve put together a plan that will address both of those issues . . . there are some overlapping clients that Alere and Paradigm have with Matria where we have excellent relationships,” Geraty said. “So we’re very confident that those two key areas of difficulty we’ve already developed a plan around.”

Inverness also said it is exploring the potential of forming a 50/50 joint venture for its health management business with unaffiliated financial investors that will allow Inverness to retain the right to repurchase the third party joint venture interest.

In addition to Alere and Paradigm, Inverness’ 2007 acquisitions included UK-based Bio-Stat Healthcare, a distributor of both core laboratory and point-of-care diagnostic testing products to the UK marketplace, for about $33.4 million; Cholestech (Hayward, California), a maker of rapid diagnostic products, which it completed in September for $326.3 million and first disclosed in June; Maritech (Newton, Massachusetts), a developer of protein-based diagnostics, for about $36 million HemoSense (San Jose, California), a developer of handheld blood coagulation monitoring systems, in an all-stock deal for $165 million; Biosite (San Diego) for $92.50 a share, beating out rival Beckman Coulter (Fullerton, California); First Check Diagnostics (Lake Forest, California), a private diagnostics firm, for about $25 million in cash; and Med-Ox Chemicals (Ottawa), a diagnostics distributor, for about $5.4 million.

The company also bought all of the capital stock of Redwood Toxicology Laboratory (Santa Rosa, California), a private drugs-of-abuse testing company, for $99 million in cash. Redwood was a portfolio company of American Capital Strategies.

Earlier this year Inverness also completed its acquisition of Panbio (Brisbane, Australia) for A$41 million, or about $37 million. That deal was first disclosed last October. Panbio makes tests for the diagnosis and management of infectious diseases.

Among proposed but not yet completed acquisitions, Inverness agreed in December to acquire all of BBI Holdings’ (Cardiff, UK) outstanding share capital for as much as $149 million. BBI makes non-invasive lateral flow tests, or in vivo diagnostics. In that arrangement, Inverness would offer BBI shareholders 195 pence (about $3.95) per ordinary share, payable in Inverness stock, with an option to select a cash alternative at 185 pence (about $3.75) a share.

Inverness was named one of two Top Pick med-tech companies for 2008 by Jefferies & Company, a global investment bank and institutional securities firm, in a recent equity research report.

In other dealmaking activity:

• Bederra (Houston) reported it has agreed to acquire the assets receivables and liabilities of privately held Lumar Diagnostic Imaging (Houston). Financial terms were not reported.

Lumar was formed to provide multi-modality diagnostic imaging services such as MRI, CT, ultrasound and pain management. The facility is located adjacent to the Houston Texas Medical Center.

Graham Williams, president of Bederra, said that the transaction is based upon using cash and debt financing.

Projected gross revenues from this acquisition for FY08 are anticipated to be more than $3 million, with profits.

Lumar will operate as a subsidiary of Bederra when the acquisition is completed, expected by the end of 1Q08.

• Beckman Coulter (BC; Fullerton, California) said it has signed four agreements with National University of Ireland (NUI; Galway) to direct assay research and acquire licenses for intellectual property that would enable development of infectious disease tests for the company’s future molecular diagnostic instrument. Research will begin early this year, BC said.

The research relies on NUI Galway nucleic acid detection technology for both bacterial and fungal targets along with Solid Phase Reversible Immobilization (SPRI) and other technologies from BC, the company said.

BC makes products designed to simplify complex biomedical tests.

• Medifacts Systems (Chicago) said it has granted an exclusive license for a genetic test patent to the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, Minnesota). The test is designed to detect Alpha Thalassemia mutations and their use as predictors of blood-related disorders, according to Medifacts.

Through the agreement, Mayo Medical Laboratories will make the test available to patients worldwide, the company said.

Thalassemia is an inherited blood disease particularly prevalent among Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, Pacific Islanders, Asian and African people. The genetic defect that causes a reduced rate of synthesis for hemoglobin is believed to provide some protection against malaria in malaria-prone areas. However, it can lead to anemia, which is the characteristic presenting symptom, and other health complications involving the spleen, gall stones, and heart failure. There is no cure for thalassemia and the best treatment available today consists of frequent blood transfusions with iron chelation therapy administered subcutaneously.

Medifacts also provides archival computer systems for medical examiners, pathology, surgery, and institutions with research and/or teaching responsibilities. The system archives medical images including DICOM images, audio and video, and accompanying data.