AcuNetx creates subsidiary for drug-, employee-testing products

SUPERIOR – AcuNetx Inc. (OTC: ANTX), a medical diagnostics company based in Superior, is spinning off its eye-tracking-and-analysis technology into a separate company called VisioNetx Inc.

Its two tracking products are Hawk Eye, for roadside police to prove drug use, and SafetyScan Cleared for Duty, for employers to determine if employees have the mental fitness to perform critical tasks. The products are scheduled to enter the market this year.

VisionNetx will function as a private subsidiary controlling the human impairment testing technology and associated intellectual property. The company will immediately seek additional private equity capital to bring the products to market.

Dr. Terry Knapp will resign as AcuNetx president and chief executive to assume the role of chairman and chief executive of VisionNetx. He will remain a director of AcuNetx. Ron Waldorf, founder of AcuNetx, will assume the chief executive role of AcuNetx.

“We at VisionNetx are tremendously excited to have this ‘pure play’ opportunity to bring worker impairment testing to a market where, until now, random urine testing has dominated, along with all the problems it introduces, such as invasion of privacy and other civil liberties issues,” Knapp said in a prepared statement.

Safety Scan costs about $1 to $3 per test as opposed to $15 to $40 for urine tests, according to Knapp, and catches a wider variety of impairments than urine testing does.

AcuNetx was formerly Eye Dynamics and became AcuNetx after its 2005 purchase of OrthoNetx, a medical devices manufacturer. The company holds patents and U.S. Food and Drug Administration approvals for a family of osteoplastic surgery products that generate new bone.

The company secured $12 million in growth capital from New Jersey-based Cornell Capital Partners LLP in spring 2006.

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