Philips buys PathXL to expand digital pathology range

28 Jun 2016

Method allows pathologists to process large datasets with image analytics to improve diagnosis, patient care.

Health technology giant Royal Philips has acquired PathXL, a Northern Ireland-based developer of digital pathology image analysis, workflow software and educational tools.

Philips says PathXL’s image analysis and tissue pathology software will complement Philips’ Digital Pathology Solutions, and help expand business in this field. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. In March 2016, PathXL reported "record financial results for 2015-2016".

Russ Granzow, General Manager of Philips Digital Pathology Solutions, commented, “With this acquisition, we are accelerating our drive to support global medical institutions in their transition to digitized pathology workflows.

He added, "Together with PathXL we will be able to offer an intelligent and integrated solution that fulfills many needs in computational pathology, education, workflow solutions and image analytics. These important and growing disciplines within pathology will enable a high-quality quantitative analysis of digital whole slide images.”

'Improved outcomes'

Digital pathology allows pathologists to review and share large sets of clinical data using image analytics with the aim of helping improve the quality of diagnosis and which has the potential to enable new therapies and to improve patient outcomes.

Philips’ lntelliSite Pathology Solution is an automated digital pathology image creation, management and viewing system comprised of an ultra-fast pathology slide scanner, an image management system and dedicated software tools.

PathXL, founded in 2004 and headquartered in Belfast, offers a range of digital pathology software applications to research and education segments of pathology and bio-pharma markets. The company has approximately 30 employees, offices in the UK and USA and distributors across three continents.