In late 2000, PanVera Corporation was acquired by Aurora Biosciences Corporation as a wholly owned subsidiary. Also SBIR-involved, Aurora acquired all of PanVeraâs outstanding common stock in a stock for stock transaction sale. The purchase expanded Auroraâs drug discovery capabilities and strengthens product pipeline, creating a drug discovery engine poised to capitalize on post-genomic opportunities. PanVera manufactures and markets protein drug targets and drug screening assays for high-throughput screening. The company has produced hundreds of recombinant proteins including nuclear receptors, protein kinases, and drug metabolizing enzymes. PanVera's revenues have grown from $3.4 million in fiscal year 1996 to $11.4 million in the fiscal year 2000.The company with its 80 employees plans to stay in Wisconsin and is building a new 52,000 square foot facility at the University Research Park (URP). PanVera now leases two URP buildings that contains its research and manufacturing facilities; administrative and marketing staff are housed in an office on Madison's west side. All company operations will be consolidated in the new building, expected to be finished in June 2001. Panvera is a spin-out from another Wisconsin SBIR-involved biotechnology company, Promega Corporation. The firm wasestablished to commercialize fluorescence polarization techniques developed in the laboratory of former UW-Madison professor Catherine Royer. The sensitive, nonradioactive, and easy-to-use core technology enables the screening of several hundred thousand potential new drugs in just a few days. Itself acquires by Vertxe Corporation in July 2001, Aurora designs, develops and commercializes advanced drug discovery technologies, services and systems to accelerate the discovery of new medicines. Aurora's core technologies include a broad portfolio of proprietary fluorescence assay technologi
