Very Brief Blog: Quest Acquires the Blueprint Genetics Laboratory

On January 22, 2020, multiple news outlets reporting that Quest has acquired Blueprint Genetics, a Helsinki-based genetics laboratory with a US center in Seattle.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

See stores at MedCityNews here, at MedTech Dive here.  Quest's press release here.

MedCityNews writes,

Secaucus, New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics said Wednesday that it would acquire Helsinki-based Blueprint Genetics. Financial terms of the all-cash deal were not disclosed. Blueprint – not to be confused with Blueprint Medicines, a U.S.-based drugmaker (...) – makes tests for 200 genetic panels and 3,900 single genes, across 14 medical specialties. It has been expanding its U.S. presence as well, with a new hub in Seattle. It focuses on gene variant interpretation using next-generation sequencing and bioinformatics technology.

See Blueprint Genetics website here.  See Blueprint newsroom for information on their recent new tests and initiatives, here.

In October 2019, Genomeweb ran a subscription article on Blueprint's new lab in Seattle (here).  The firm had raised €23M from investors and had €15M in global CY2018 revenue, expecting that to double in CY2019.

Medicare Part B and Quest's 2017 Genomics Payments (Spreadsheet)

Medicare paid claims data for Quest and other providers for CY2017 is available at CMS (here). 

I've put an Excel spreadsheet in the cloud for 2017 Part B Quest paid claims for CPT codes 812xx 813xx 814xx (most of genomics) here.   

Part B 2017 payments to Quest tallied about $2.8M dollars allowed.  Total CMS genomic payments in 2017 were circa $500M, so Quest garnered about 0.5%.

Quest's billings are somewhat complicated; for example, they billed Medicare for 81206 (BCR ABL) from about 15 different locations. 

The two largest volume codes were 81206 (BCR ABL minor breakpoint), 2375 services for $522,000; and 81207 (BCR ABL major breakpoint), 1393 services for $220,000.   Quest also garnered around $500,000 for different codes under HLA genotyping.  BCR-ABL and HLA were about half of Part B payments to Quest in the genomics code series.

Quest also garnered about $440,00 for Level II codes (tiers 2,3,4), and almost nothing for unlisted code 81479.

(sample screenshot of spreadsheet)