Profile: Waters Corporation (WAT)

Waters corporation (waters) is engaged in analytical instrument manufacturing, designing, , selling and servicing, through its waters division, high performance liquid chromatography (hplc), ultra performance liquid chromatography (uplc) and mass spectrometry (ms) instrument systems and support products, including chromatography columns, other consumable products and post-warranty service plans. Through its TA division (ta), the Company designs, manufactures, sells and services thermal analysis, rheometry and calorimetry instruments. The company is also a developer and supplier of software-based products that interface with the Company’s instruments, as well as other manufacturers’ instruments. The company’s products are used by pharmaceutical, life science, biochemical, industrial, academic and government customers working in research and development and other laboratory applications. The company operates through two segments: waters division and ta division.

Waters division

HPLC is the standard technique used to identify and analyze the constituent components of a variety of chemicals and other materials. HPLC is used to analyze substances in a variety of industries for research and development purposes and process engineering applications. HPLC is used to identify drugs, develop manufacturing methods and assure the potency and purity of new pharmaceuticals. HPLC is also used in a variety of other applications, such as analyses of foods and beverages for nutritional labeling and compliance with safety regulations, the testing of water and air purity within the environmental testing industry, as well as applications in other industries, such as chemical and consumer products.

HPLC is also used by universities, research institutions and government agencies, such as the United States food and drug administration and the United States environmental protection agency (epa) and their international counterparts that mandate testing that requires HPLC instrumentation. HPLC system has consisted of five basic components: solvent delivery system, sample injector, separation column, detector and data acquisition unit. The solvent delivery system pumps the solvent through the HPLC system, while the sample injector introduces the sample into the solvent flow. The chromatography column then separates the sample into its components for analysis by the detector, which measures the presence and amount of the constituents. The data acquisition unit, usually referred to as the instrument’s software or data system, then records and stores the information from the detector.

Acquity uplc helps researchers and analysts to achieve chemical separations and faster analysis times. Acquity uplc is compatible with the Company's software products and the general operating protocols of HPLC. The primary consumable products for LC are chromatography columns.

Waters manufactures LC instruments that are offered in configurations that allow for varying degrees of automation, from component configured systems for academic research applications to fully automated systems for regulated testing, and that have a variety of detection technologies, from ultra-violet (uv) absorbance to ms, optimized for certain analyses. The company also manufactures tailored LC systems for the analysis of biologics, as well as an LC detector utilizing evaporative light scattering technology to expand the usage of LC to compounds that are not amenable to uv absorbance detection.

In December 2008, the Company acquired the net assets of analytical products group, inc. (apg), a provider of environmental testing products for quality control and proficiency testing used in environmental laboratories. In February 2006, the Company acquired the net assets of the food safety business of vicam limited partnership (Vicam). Vicam is a provider of tests to identify and quantify mycotoxins in various agricultural commodities. The company’s test kits provide reliable, quantitative detection of particular mycotoxins through the choice of flurometer, lc-ms or HPLC. The apg, era and vicam acquisitions have all been integrated into the chromatography column product line.

Mass spectrometry is an analytical technique that is used to identify unknown compounds, to quantify known materials and to elucidate the structural and chemical properties of molecules by measuring the masses of individual molecules that have been converted into ions. Company develops, manufactures, sales and distributes of ms instruments. These instruments can be integrated and used along with other complementary analytical instruments and systems, such as lc, chemical electrophoresis, chemical electrophoresis chromatography and gas chromatography. A wide variety of instrumental designs fall within the overall category of ms instrumentation, including devices that incorporate quadrupole, ion trap, time of flight (tof) and classical magnetic sector technologies.

The company's spectrometers are referred to as lc detectors, and are either sold as part of an lc system or as an lc upgrade. Large quadrupole systems, such as the waters quattro micro and quattro xe instruments, are used primarily for experiments performed for late stage drug development, including clinical trial testing, and q-tof instruments, such as the Company’s q-tof micro and q-tof instruments, are often used to analyze the role of proteins in disease processes, an application sometimes referred to as proteomics. During the year ended December 31, 2006, the Company introduced a tandem quadrupole device, the tqd, and a new hybrid quadrupole time of flight technology system, the Synapt Hdms. The Synapt Hdms system integrates ion mobility technology within a q-tof geometry instrument configuration and allows researchers to glean molecular shape information, a capability for a mass spectrometry instrument.

LC and ms are instrumental technologies often embodied within an analytical system tailored for either a dedicated class of analyses or as a purpose analytical device. An increasing percentage of the Company’s customers are purchasing LC and ms components and it is becoming common for LC and ms instrumentation to be used within the same laboratory and be operated by the same user.

TA division

Thermal analysis measures the physical characteristics of materials as a function of temperature. Changes in temperature affect several characteristics of materials, such as their physical state, weight, dimension and mechanical and electrical properties, which may be measured by one or more thermal analysis techniques, including calorimetry. Consequently, thermal analysis techniques are used in the development, production and characterization of materials in various industries, such as plastics, chemicals, automobiles, pharmaceuticals and electronics. Thermal analysis and rheometry instruments are used in material testing laboratories and, in many cases, provide information useful in predicting the suitability of polymers and viscous liquids for various industrial, consumer goods and healthcare products. As with systems offered through the waters division, a range of instrumental configurations are available with increasing levels of sample handling and information processing automation. In july 2008, the Company acquired the net assets of VTI corporation (vti), a manufacturer of sorption analysis and thermogravimetric analysis instruments.

Vti’s products are used in the evaluation of pharmaceuticals, catalysts and energy-related materials. This acquisition adds two technologies which complement TA’s existing gravimetric analysis product line. VTI sorption analysis products are designed for water and organic vapor sorption studies of pharmaceuticals and related materials. Vti’s high pressure, high vacuum TGA projects are designed for high pressure sorption studies which are commonly used in the analysis of energy-related materials.