Qiagen

In 1984, QIAGEN was established on November 29 by a team of scientists at the Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Germany. Two years later, QIAGEN launched its first product, a kit for purification of plasmids – small ring-shaped DNA molecules in bacterial cells – cutting the preparation time for plasmids from between two and three days down to two hours. 1996 saw the initial public offering of QIAGEN on the technology-oriented Nasdaq stock exchange, becoming the first German company to do so. 1997 saw the initial public offering on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in Germany.

Acquisitions

In 2004, QIAGEN acquired key assets of Molecular Staging, Inc. Two years later, QIAGEN established its Asia regional headquarters in Shanghai. In 2007 sales reached US$649.8 million and the number of employees surpassed 2,600. QIAGEN acquired Digene for US$1.6 billion, furthering QIAGEN in molecular diagnostics by revenue and diagnostics for disease prevention.In 2009, QIAGEN began building its Personalized Healthcare business through the acquisition of DxS Ltd, in a deal valued at US$95 million and it acquired SABiosciences Corp. in a deal valued at US$90 million. At the end of 2009 QIAGEN surpassed the US$1 billion revenue mark and had over 3,500 employees. QIAGEN became one of the first companies to release a clinically verified diagnostic test for the detection of H1N1, more commonly known as Swine Flu.In 2010, QIAGEN acquired ESE GmbH, giving the company access to point of need testing devices for the application of molecular diagnostic tests without laboratory infrastructure. QIAGEN launched the QIAsymphony AS and QIAsymphony RGQ platforms, adding to the company's portfolio for laboratory workflow automation and molecular test full-process automation respectively.In 2011, QIAGEN acquired Ipsogen S.A. for US$101 million, adding to the company's product and IP portfolio in the blood cancer space and developing its position in molecular diagnostics for oncology. QIAGEN also acquired Cellestis Limited for US$374 million, giving the company access to QuantiFERON technology for disease detection and prevention. The company added two new offices in the Asia Pacific region in New Delhi, India and Taipei, Taiwan. The company announced a comprehensive restructuring program to focus on high-growth areas such as personalized medicine and business in emerging markets. The program includes workforce reduction and internal restructuring affecting approximately 10% of the company's 3,900 positions.In 2013, QIAGEN acquired Ingenuity Systems. QIAGEN also acquired CLC bio, which offers bioinformatics analysis software. In 2015, QIAGEN acquired AdnaGen's circulating tumor cell enrichment technology. QIAGEN also acquired Enzymatics enzyme solutions.In March 2015, a management buyout of QIAGEN Marseille led to the creation of HalioDx. In late 2015 the GeneReader NGS System was launched, and the acquisition of Mo Bio Laboratories was completed.In 2016, QIAGEN acquired the Danish molecular diagnostics company Exiqon.In 2017,QIAGEN acquired OmicSoft Corporation, a leading provider of highly curated public datasets.

In 2018, QIAGEN transferred listing to New York Stock Exchange. In April 2018, QIAGEN acquired the Spanish firm STAT-Dx and launched the QIAstat-Dx molecular diagnostics platform.

In 2019, QIAGEN announced the acquisition of Formulatrix assets to develop a digital PCR platform. An additional acquisition of N-of-One, a privately held U.S. molecular decision support company and pioneer in clinical interpretation services for complex genomic data, to expand its QCI bioinformatics offerings with Real World Insights. In October 2019 QIAGEN entered into an agreement with Illumina granting QIAGEN non-exclusive rights to develop and globally commercialize IVD kits to be used together with Illumina's diagnostic instruments.In September 2020 QIAGEN announced the acquisition of Michigan-based NeuMoDx Inc. to market two fully integrated systems for automated PCR.

2020 Thermo Fisher Acquisition Target

On March 3, 2020, Thermo Fisher Scientific announced plans for the acquisition of QIAGEN at €39 per share in cash, which valued the transaction at $11.5 billion at the time.The day after an open letter by hedge fund Davidson Kempner Capital Management, one of QIAGEN's largest shareholders, to reject the bid as undervalued, Thermo Fisher raised their tender by 10% to €43 per share, an advance of $1B in value. Davidson Kempner subsequently increased their holdings from 5.1% to 7.3% of QIAGEN.The acquisition offer was terminated on August 13, 2020 having only reached the threshold of 47% of shareholder approval, below the minimum 66.6% required as per agreement. Davidson Kempner was notable as having continued to reject the bid. Because of the lapsed offer, QIAGEN was required to reimburse $95 Million to Thermo Fisher in expenses. Within a week of the collapse of the merger, QIAGEN's stock rose over 10%.

On August 21, the chairman of the company's supervisory board, Håkan Björklund, stepped down to be immediately replaced by Lawrence Rosen.Resulting from the failed takeover bid, QIAGEN announced it would buy the outstanding 80.1% of shares in NeuMoDx Molecular Inc, it did not already own for about $234 million.

COVID-19

Since early 2020, QIAGEN worked closely with governments, public health authorities, and customers worldwide to ensure the availability of critical COVID-19 testing diagnostics, covering the needs of clinical and research customers. The company offers a comprehensive portfolio of SARS-CoV-2 testing solutions. The tests and kits cover manual to automated sample processing, low to high throughput, single-plex to multi-plex, and from active infection testing to detecting previous viral exposure.

In September 2021, QIAGEN entered the DAX – Germany’s leading stock market index.

In May 2022, QIAGEN strengthened its sample technologies business and acquired the majority stake in enzymes provider BLIRT S.A.