Agilent Technologies have signed a definitive agreement to acquire Varian, paying $1.5 billion. As well as adding $1 billion in annual sales to Agilent’s existing $5.8 billion, it significantly expands the range of technologies in Agilent’s portfolio. Varian are particularly strong in NMR, imaging and vacuum technologies, but also can offer a number of atomic and molecular spectroscopies.

“This acquisition is a major step in Agilent’s transformation into a leading bio-analytical measurement company”, said Bill Sullivan, Agilent’s president and chief executive officer. This is a most interesting insight into the company’s plans and perhaps indicates further acquisitions in the future.

For a number of years, the analytical instrument industry has seen a constant round of acquisitions. Varian, itself, has made a number of acquisitions in recent years including Polymer Laboratories, Digilab and Magnex Scientific.

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