Bio-Techne Corp. (TECH)

Bio-Techne develops, manufactures and sells life science reagents, instruments and services for the research, diagnostics and bioprocessing markets. The products are the tools other people use: they support investigations into biological processes and molecular diagnostics, aid drug discovery, and underpin clinical tests and diagnoses. It is a Minnesota corporation with global headquarters in Minneapolis, founded in 1976 as Research and Diagnostic Systems and publicly traded since 1985 through a merger with Techne Corporation. The product lines run to hundreds of thousands of items, most of them made in-house at multiple sites in North America plus locations in the United Kingdom, Canada, Switzerland and China. It employed about 3,000 full-time and part-time people at 30 June 2026, about 2,200 of them in the United States. The financial year ends on 30 June. There are two segments.

Protein Sciences

This is the larger segment at approximately 72 percent of net sales in fiscal 2026, and it has two divisions. Reagent Solutions covers specialised proteins such as cytokines and growth factors, antibodies, small molecules, tissue culture sera and cell selection technologies, sold under brands including R&D Systems, Tocris Biosciences and Novus Biologicals. The company states that it believes it is the world leader in high quality proteins, both for research use and under current Good Manufacturing Practices. Analytical Solutions covers manual and automated protein analysis instruments and immunoassays used to quantify proteins in biological fluids, including plate-based immunoassays, fully automated multiplex immunoassays, and automated western blotting and isoelectric focusing, under the R&D Systems and ProteinSimple brands. The FDA has cleared a few of those immunoassays for use as in vitro diagnostic devices. Customers are researchers in academia and industry, chiefly pharmaceutical and biotech companies and contract research organisations, plus diagnostic and therapeutic customers including those developing cell- and gene-based therapies.

Diagnostics and Spatial Biology

The other segment, approximately 28 percent of net revenues in fiscal 2026, also has two divisions. The Spatial Biology division sells in-situ hybridization assays under the Advanced Cell Diagnostics brand, for transcriptome, DNA copy and structural variation analysis inside intact cells at single cell resolution, which is useful for complex tissue profiling because the spatial context is preserved. Lunaphore, acquired in the first quarter of fiscal 2024, brought fully automated spatial biology using precision microfluidics; its COMET instrument automates the RNAscope assays and uses antibodies to detect protein and RNA biomarkers on the same slide at single-cell resolution. The Bio-Techne Diagnostic division makes regulated calibrators and controls for the clinical setting, plus instrument and process controls for haematology, blood chemistry, blood gases and coagulation, often manufactured to a customer's own assay technology and supplied liquid, frozen or lyophilised. Most of those go out on an original equipment manufacturer basis to instrument makers, with most products FDA-cleared. Genetic carrier screening, oncology diagnostics, molecular controls and research products are sold under the Asuragen brand, mainly to laboratories for lab-developed tests or as regulated diagnostic kits.

How it sells, and to whom

Products go directly to customers mainly in North America, Europe and China, through a distribution agreement with Thermo Fisher Scientific, and through third-party distributors in China, Japan, certain eastern European countries and the rest of the world. Sales are widely spread: no single end-user customer accounted for more than 10 percent of either segment's net sales in fiscal 2026, 2025 or 2024. Most products ship within a day of the order, instruments and their cartridges within one to two weeks.

Acquisitions, and a pending sale of the company

Growth has come partly by buying businesses and product portfolios that filled gaps or widened the geographic reach, and the acquired companies' brands have largely been kept but unified under the single Bio-Techne name. The company took a 19.9 percent stake in Wilson Wolf, a provider of cell culture devices for cell-based therapies, in fiscal 2023, and the filing states that it will acquire the remaining ownership by the end of calendar year 2027, or earlier if Wilson Wolf achieves agreed revenue or EBITDA targets. On 25 June 2026 Bio-Techne agreed to be acquired by Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, under a merger in which each outstanding share converts into the right to receive $73.00 in cash and the company survives as a wholly owned subsidiary. The filing states that the merger is expected to close by late 2026 or early 2027, subject to customary closing conditions including regulatory approvals and shareholder approval.

From Bio-Techne's annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended 30 June 2026. The filing