LONDON (ShareCast) - Acambis rallied after the smallpox vaccine developer announced late Friday that it has agreed a £276m cash offer from French drugs giant Sanofi Pasteur.

Acambis shareholders will get 190p a share.

“Sanofi Pasteur, which is one of the world's largest vaccines companies, will benefit strategically not only from Acambis' pipeline and technologies, but also from its significant US-based R&D and manufacturing infrastructure,” said Acambis chairman Peter Fellner.

Shares in Pace dropped after the set-top box maker reported a slight drop in first half pre-tax profit due to £600,000 of exceptional costs.

The group, which supplies digital TV technology for BSkyB, said pre-tax profit fell to £10.5m for the six months to 30 June from £10.6m the year before on revenue up 22% to £231.1m. Profit before exceptionals was £11.2m.

Pace said the integration of its acquisition Royal Philips Electronics is progressing well and is already profitable.

FTSE TechMARK - Risers
Acambis (ACM) 185.50p +59.91%
Alizyme (AZM) 8.49p +21.63%
Vectura Group (VEC) 54.00p +8.00%
BTG (BGC) 202.75p +6.71%
Optos (OPTS) 155.00p +6.16%
ProStrakan (PSK) 79.50p +6.00%
Biocompatibles International (BII) 162.00p +5.88%
SDL International (SDL) 372.00p +5.83%
Phoenix IT Group (PNX) 290.00p +3.02%
Oxford Instruments (OXIG) 230.00p +2.91%

FTSE TechMARK - Fallers
Inion (IIN) 6.00p -17.24%
AEA Technology (AAT) 41.75p -11.17%
Alphameric (ALM) 17.00p -6.85%
Pace (PIC) 83.00p -5.14%
Torotrak (TRK) 19.00p -5.00%
Vtech (VTH) 247.50p -3.88%
Turbo Power Systems (TPS) 3.25p -3.70%
Corin Group (CRG) 143.00p -3.38%
Redstone (RED) 47.00p -2.08%
Anite Group (AIE) 35.25p -2.08%

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