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Drug Giant Roche Seals the Deal For Ventana Medical Systems (Based in Tucson)
Swiss drug giant Roche has virtually locked up smaller local Ventana Medical Systems, based in Oro Valley, Arizona. The deal was for $89.50 per share. Based in Basel, Switzerland, Roche tried persuasion with Ventana for over a year, then made a hostile bid in June of 2007. Finally after much negotiation, they came to terms for the company at the $89.50 per share level. Ventana Medical Systems has more than 800 employees worldwide, and 660 of those reside in Oro Valley, Arizona. Ventana develops medical equipment for cancer detection.
So what does this have to do with real estate you may be asking? Well it’s very simple. After the purchase goes completely through (which will be soon), Roche plans on ramping up the Ventana operations and adding many people. When all these high paying jobs are added to the area, there will be additional demand helping pull the local real estate market back to a more stable level. These additional jobs alone will not do this, but as previously mentioned in earlier posts, local job creation is one of the critical factors in creating demand for homes in the Oro Valley area. Oro Valley is, for the most part, weathering the real estate storm better than other areas of Tucson. The foothills may be doing better, but only because of the much higher home prices. Oro Valley also has higher prices than average and was not as exposed to the sub-prime mess that has hurt the south, southeast, and southwest of Tucson as well as Sahuarita.