DHI buyer: No moveout planned

The head of a San Diego company that is buying out the locally based Diagnostic Hybrids, Inc., re-affirmed on Wednesday his firm's commitment to keeping the DHI operation in Athens.

Douglas Bryant, president and CEO of Quidel Corporation, said at a news conference that current plans call for keeping DHI's manufacturing and research-and-development facilities intact, and possibly even expanding or adding to them.

"We really intend to operate the business here as long as we are successful, and we plan to be successful," said Bryant, whose company is in the process of acquiring DHI for approximately $130 million. "We're actually thinking more of things we can move here."

Bryant said that while some specific jobs now done at the Athens facility "“ he offered the example of tax preparation "“ might be absorbed by the parent corporation, the likelihood is for more total jobs to be created in Athens, not for cutbacks in employment.

He noted that with anticipated increased sales of the medical test kits the company makes, will come more need for packaging and shipping "“ which are done from Athens.

"It's highly likely that we would be adding people," Bryant said.

Both Bryant and DHI President/CEO Dave Scholl said the merger will be a boon both for Ohio University, which holds licenses to some of the bio-engineering technology that goes into DHI products, and the region, which could become a magnet for bio-firms.

"Yes, most definitely, yes," said Scholl, when asked if increased sales for Quidel would mean more royalty income for OU. "All of our partners win when we win."

On the topic of the newly merged company as an engine for economic growth in the region, Scholl cited DHI's third-place showing in the Athens NEWS Best of Athens readers' poll, in the category "Best Evidence that Athens County is Moving Forward."

Noting that the first- and second-place finishers were, respectively, the Nelsonville Rt. 33 bypass and OU's increasing enrollment, Scholl suggested this outcome neatly encapsulates three factors crucial to economic growth "“ transportation access, education and entrepreneurship.

"While I thought we were number one, I'm OK being number three," he joked.