A Medical Device Daily

Virtual Radiologic (VRC; Minnetonka, Minnesota) reported the closing of its initial public offering of 4.6 million shares of common stock at $17 a share.

The offering consisted of 4 million shares offered by VRC and an additional 600,000 shares offered by certain selling stockholders following the exercise by the underwriters of their option to buy additional shares in the offering.

The company first reported filing for its IPO last year, and reported pricing the offering earlier this month with the hopes of raising about $78.2 million if all over-allotments were exercised.

VRC said it intends to use the proceeds to repay outstanding debt and for general corporate purposes. Shares of the company's stock are listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol VRAD.

Goldman, Sachs acted as the sole book-running manager of the offering, while Merrill Lynch acted as co-lead manager and William Blair acted as co-manager.

VRC provides remote diagnostic image interpretation, or teleradiology, services.

In other financing and earnings news:

  • Bioject Medical Technologies (Portland, Oregon), a developer of needle-free injection therapy systems, said it has entered into convertible debt financing with Ed Flynn, a private investor and previous board member. In addition to Fynn's funding, Bioject's CEO and other executive officers and a member of the board are also participating in this round of funding. The company has received or has commitments to receive an aggregate of $615,000. Flynn, who will be rejoining the company's board of directors, has also provided additional funding to help "move the company forward," Bioject said. Bioject also said it has entered into a forbearance agreement with Partners for Growth (PFG) with respect to its outstanding term and convertible debt agreements. PFG has agreed to forbearance until June 1, and has agreed not to declare an event of default or exercise other remedies under the PFG loans with respect to certain specified events. Bioject has agreed to pay down $550,000 of its revolving line of credit and to reprice PFG's convertible debt note and warrants to 90 cents a share. Bioject also received two Nasdaq deficiency letters this month indicating it has failed to comply with stockholders' equity, market value of listed securities and net loss from continuing operations requirements for continued listing and that it has failed to comply with the $1 minimum bid price requirement for continued listing.
  • LCA Vision (Cincinnati), a provider of laser vision correction services under the LasikPlus brand, said its board of directors declared a quarterly dividend of 18 cents a share. The dividend will be payable on Dec. 12 to shareholders of record as of Dec. 5. LCA-Vision operates 71 LasikPlus fixed-site laser vision correction centers in 32 states and 56 markets in the U.S. and a joint venture in Canada.
  • Precision Optics (Garner, Massachusetts) reported unaudited operating results for 1Q08 ended Sept. 30 showing an increase in revenue of $674,103, or 158%, from the same period in the prior year. The revenue — $1,101,728 — represents the second highest quarterly revenue in six years, according to Precision. The company attributed the increase to shipments to a "significant new customer of an advanced surgical visualization system" along with the introduction of other new products. Net loss for the quarter was $466,848, a decrease of $221,331 from the net loss of $688,179 for the same period last year. The decrease in net loss is the result of higher sales volumes along with a corresponding increase in gross profit, the company said. Gross profit for the quarter, as a percentage of revenues, increased from 10% to 28%. The weighted average common shares outstanding for the quarters ended Sept. 30, 2007 and 2006 were 25,458,212 and 15,458,212, respectively. Precision makes medical instruments, optical thin film coatings, micro-optics with characteristic dimensions less than 1 mm, and other advanced optical systems.
  • Possis Medical (Minneapolis), maker of devices used in endovascular procedures, reported results for its 1Q08, showing a 21% increase in net sales to $18.9 million from 1Q07 sales of $15.6 million. The company reported net earnings of $104,000 compared to a net loss of $234,000 for the prior-year period. Possis' gross profit margin was 69.4%, up from 68.4% in 4Q07, and compared with 71.7% in the year-ago first quarter. The company attributed the year-over-year decrease to a shift in overall sales mix to lower-margin Ultra System Consoles from disposables. As more Ultra Consoles are placed, Ultra Thrombectomy Set usage is expected to build, leading to a higher-margin product mix and lower manufacturing costs, Possis said.