Nichols Institute Acquires Houston’s MPC Laboratories

Nichols Institute, operator of a chain of medical laboratories with headquarters in San Juan Capistrano, announced Tuesday that it has completed its acquisition of MPC Laboratories Inc., a Houston company that provides medical laboratory tests for hospitals.

Nichols paid about $7 million in cash in the transaction, of which portions went to the purchase of MPC’s outstanding stock. An undetermined amount of the sales price was in exchange for a promise from principal MPC shareholders that they would not establish a competing laboratory in its three hospitals and other facilities in the greater Houston area for five years.

This is the third acquisition for Nichols this year. Earlier it bought Path Lab Inc. in El Paso for a combination of notes, cash and future payments totaling $12.9 million, and MAWD Medical Laboratories Inc. in Kansas City, Mo., for cash, notes and new issues of convertible preferred Nichols stock with a combined value of $6.7 million.