News
Boise firm, Sapidyne, gets ready to scale up
Sapidyne finds success making testing devices
A Boise biotechnology firm is ready to break out of its “stealth” mode this year, launching an aggressive growth plan that could have a hefty impact on its bottom line.
Julie Howard
The Idaho Statesman
Sapidyne Instruments Inc., http://www.sapidyne.com/ an 8-year-old company that makes testing equipment for drug manufacturers, has built a series of equipment prototypes that company officials say will do everything from test for soil and water contamination to monitor bacteria growth in milk production.
The firm, which already has client list that includes some of the biggest drug manufacturers in the world, has maintained a low profile while steadily increasing revenues and being profitable from nearly the start.
*****************
The Sapidyne file
Company: Sapidyne Instruments Inc.
Founded: 1995 in Boise
Location: 796 W. Diamond Road in southeast Boise
What it does: Makes testing equipment for everything from drug manufacturing to environmental monitoring
Employees: 8
Revenue: Company is private and does not disclose sales figures. Company executives say annual revenue is nearly $1 million
*****************
While privately held and so not required to disclose financial data, Sapidyne Chairman and President Steve Lackie said the company is approaching $1 million in annual sales and has shown revenue growth averaging 40 percent over the past five years.
To Lackie and his team, that´s just the beginning of the story.
“We´ve been working hard to get the foundation in place, and now we´re looking to scale the business,” said Lackie, one of the company´s founders.
Sapidyne has targeted two markets with its current testing equipment”; the $15 billion a year drug discovery industry and the $11 billion a year life science research business. The inroads to those competitive research labs was slow, acknowledged Lackie, explaining that researchers have to be convinced why they should spend valuable money and time running their experiments through a new piece of equipment that has a base price of more than $80,000.
As more researchers became convinced that Sapidyne´s patented products could offer a higher level of sensitivity in detecting substances, sales grew through word-of-mouth — bolstered by numerous articles published by researchers.
“We became interested almost two years ago,” said Pierre-Alexandre Brault, a biochemist for Eli Lilly & Co., a pharmaceutical conglomerate with early stage drug research facilities in Indianapolis. “We bought one (Sapidyne testing device) and recently bought another, and as we learn more about this equipment and use it more and more, we might be buying more in the future.”
Brault said the testing instruments made by Sapidyne can measure interactions between drugs and their targets in ways that other equipment cannot do.
Lackie said it is the high level of sensitivity that his instruments offer that makes them valuable to customers.
Tulane University and Xavier University in New Orleans are working with new prototypes from Sapidyne — handheld monitoring instruments that allow researchers to get immediate results of environmental tests in the field.
In addition, the Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry in Japan has teamed up with Sapidyne in a special agreement.
That agreement involves another company founder, physicist Tom Glass, working on a two-year assignment doing research for that Japanese research lab using Sapidyne equipment.
A variety of new products in prototype phase are expected to lead Sapidyne into new industries as varied as substance abuse testing and monitoring bacteria levels in the food industry. A robotic instrument, now under development, will enable a laboratory to do automated testing on numerous samples 24 hours a day.
To deal with the new products, new industries and a new emphasis on growth, the firm´s executives have decided to hire a small core of sales and marketing professionals over the next year and to outsource production to a Boise-area company. All that means the need for an infusion of capital, a new frontier for a company that so far has boot-strapped its way to success.
“I was surprised and excited to find them here,” said Phil Reed, who handles seed capital investments for Highway 12 Ventures, a venture capital firm in Boise.
Reed said his job leads him into discussions with numerous start-up companies, and that while Sapidyne isn´t a new firm, it is one Highway 12 plans to keep an eye on. In any case, Reed has been happy to provide advice to Sapidyne´s management team on growth strategies.
“This is one of the very exciting companies in Boise,” said Reed. “They seem to have found their place in a market that has a potential for growth. It´s a true entrepreneurs´ story.”
To offer story ideas or comments, contact Julie Howard
[email protected] or 373-6618
MATR Supporters (view all)
Sorry, we couldn't find any posts. Please try a different search.