Torex takes shares slump to buy abroad

The company is raising £27.2m to fund the purchase of German and Swiss medical software group Laufenberg, for which it will pay £36m cash and 636,000 shares, a total of £39.9m. Founders Hanjorg and Carsten Laufenberg will be in charge of Torex's business outside Europe but will not be on the board.

Michael Meade of bankers UBS Warburg, which arranged the deal, said the volatility of the market was making such discounts common. Shares were issued in a rights issue to current shareholders at 480p. The price of those trading on the London Stock Exchange slumped by 32p to 620p.

Torex will market Laufenberg's software to private hospitals in the UK and the Netherlands and aims to sell its lab software to its 63 UK hospital trust customers. Laufenberg is reckoned to have about 35 per cent of the market for laboratory systems in Europe and is the fourth largest supplier of hospital information systems in Germany.

Torex last year made £4.04m pre tax on sales of £46.7m of its GP and retail software and its services and outsourcing operations.