Good morning. My name is Alpha and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the QIAGEN Third Quarter 2007 Results Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer period. [Operator Instructions]. Thank you. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Solveigh Mahler, Director of Investor Relations. Ma'am you may begin your conference.

Thank you very much Alpha. And hello everybody. Welcome to QIAGEN's third quarter 2007 earnings conference call. I am Solveigh Mahler, Director of Investor Relations at QIAGEN. With me on the call are QIAGEN's CEO, Peer Schatz and QIAGEN's CFO, Roland Sackers. We issued the press release today announcing QIAGEN's financial results for the third quarter and first nine months ended September 30, 2007 and describing the company's recent business highlights. A copy of this announcement as well as the presentation we will be using during this conference call can be downloaded from the Investor Relations section of our home page at www.qiagen.com. This conference call will cover 20 minutes presentation followed by Q&A session. The time of the conference call is set at one hour. We therefore would like to ask you to please limit yourself to only two questions during the Q&A session. The call will be archived on our website. Before I turn over to Peer Schatz, please keep in mind that the following discussion and the responses to your questions reflect management's views as of today, November 6 2007. As you listen to the call, I encourage you to have our press release and presentation in front of you since our financial results and detailed commentaries are included and will correspond to the discussion that follows. As we share information today to help you better understand our business, it is important to keep in mind that we will make statements and provide responses in the course of this conference call that state our intention, believes, expectations or predictions of the future. These constitute forward-looking statements for the purpose of the Safe Harbor provision. These forward-looking statements involve certain risks and uncertainties that could cause QIAGEN's actual results to differ from those projected. QIAGEN disclaims any intention or obligation to revise any forward-looking statements. For the description of such risks and uncertainties, please refer to the discussions and reports that QIAGEN has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. With this, I would like to hand over to Peer Schatz.

Yes thank you Solveigh and thanks for joining QIAGEN's third quarter 2007 conference call. We had a very strong performance in this third quarter 2007. Revenues came in at a $176.6 million, EPS on adjusted basis at $0.17. Net income on an adjusted basis grew 42% and the strong performance in this third quarter 2007 allows us to increase full year 2007 EPS adjusted guidance. Overall revenue growth, as I said was every strong. We grew 50%, significantly advancing our leadership positions almost all across the board. Strong organic growth rate, underlying the overall growth rate has been very strong again, continuing a very strong performance in our sample and assay technology core areas. We believe we increased market leadership and share in all markets we serve. At the core of this success is and continues to be QIAGEN's success in innovating. Once again, 4% of sales come from products we launched within the trailing 12 months. This continues to be a record for our industry and we're actually facing one of the strongest pipelines ever looking into 2008. The Digene integration is running very well. It is fully on track, all major projects have been started; some have actually already been completed, I have more details on that in a slide a little bit later. So many good things happened in this third quarter 2007, on top of that and what certainly captured a lot of headlines were landmark studies which were published demonstrating the value of HPV testing, including such value as a primary screen, and this is clearly very important as we are rolling out this product into many markets that do not have established testing regimes yet. So overall, both operationally, financially, but also strategically a very strong performance in this third quarter, we exceeded our…

Thank you, Peer and good afternoon everyone in Europe and good morning to those joining from the U.S. I believe our numbers this quarter are a testament to the strong strategic and operational highlights that Peer just outlined for you already. Our leadership in molecular diagnostics is boosted by a deep pipeline of technology opportunities and allows cost and sales synergies. This is superior growth profile and double-digit organic growth. We feel we are well on track going into the first quarter and on a solid footing for attaining our goals for the fiscal year 2007, therefore the increase in our fiscal year 2007 guidance. So taking a closer look now at our third quarter results on slide 17. We are pleased with this outcome as we exceeded our financial goals. We reported revenues of $176.6 million U.S., which are up by 50% over the same period last year. Our sales of HPV testing product are recorded in our sales to customers transforming molecular diagnostics. These sales continue to gain momentum, exceeding our expectations and further reinforcing our position as a market leader. They exceeded our targets for such HPV related sales in the third quarter and remain confident in our ability to grow our HPV testing business between $58 million to $60 million U.S. in the first quarter and further accelerating this business to $260 million to $270 million U.S. for calendar 2008, as we have guided before. As you may know, it is our policy not to break out individual products or business from past acquisition and our approach is to show consolidated figures which incorporate the revenue from Digene and to HPV tests. This policy is also reflective of how we conduct our business, where HPV is a part of an integrated molecular diagnostics strategy. We saw…

Thanks Roland. So overall here on slide 24 is summary, as very strong third quarter, well on track, revenues up 50%, organic growth of 10% and a strong first nine months. But very important here is strong strategic momentum. We are seeing a very exciting market environment across the board. In our molecular diagnostic business HPV testing is getting more and more accepted also even outside the United States and we are very well positioned to take also the instrument [ph] business going forward. As integration of our acquired businesses is very well on track and we look forward to moving on this project very actively now over the next three months. The guidance for the full year 2007 as given by Roland before $614 million to $635 million on the top line and $0.61 to $0.62 which represents an increase of about $0.03 compared to the previous guidance. So overall a very strong performance and we are looking at very positively into 2008. And last but not least on slide 25, I would like to introduce you to somebody here in new on our QIAGEN team. I know a lot of you know how Al Leury very well. Al has been with Digene for seven years in Investor Relations and other related functions. He brings to... he will be joining our Investor Relations team and this is a great addition to our team. And he has such a strong academic background in both science and finance, a BS in biology and a bachelor's degree in economics and also he's a graduate from Warton with an MBA. His contact information is here on the slide, and he will be the contact before all... investors are increased in the United States if you like to move to this channel. And we look forward also to introducing him and to you in person going forward for those who have not yet met him. With that, I would like to hand back to Solveigh.

Thank you very much Peer. We are now looking forward to taking your questions. To open the Q&A session I would like to hand over to the operator, Alpha. Question And Answer

Thank you. The floor is now open for questions. [Operator Instructions]. Our first question is coming from Bill Quirk with Piper Jaffray. Please go ahead.

Thank you and good morning or good afternoon. I suppose in terms of your perspective. First question here I know you don't like to break out the Digene contribution by geography but it looks like the European business actually continues to grow in excess of the U.S, is our math correct here?

Well it certainly is coming from a much smaller number and clearly we are seeing effects of these tests rolling out in certain countries leveraging our sales infrastructure. So maybe first overall we gave certain number targets for the third quarter and we came well within those or actually exceeded those targets for the HPV related business. The international mix is one that I wouldn't want to break out at this point in time. I would say however molecular diagnostics business in Europe had a very strong quarter in the third quarter.

Excellent, thank you. Second question actually has to do with the pipeline and in particularly the hospital-acquired infection launched, good to hear that this is tied up for 2008. But I was hoping Peer I know you don't want to give too many details away until the analyst day but perhaps you could help us think a little bit about the launch timing, is this beginning of '08, kind of end of '08 and should we assume that this is going to include more than an MRSA assay that we are looking at more of a panel approach?

Well first to the latter question, the profile of the assay, our QIAplex technology allows us to put a lot of real estate onto a panel, so with very high sensitivity we can hit many targets within a given sample and this is a benefit that we want to bring to our customers. So we're re not thinking about an MRSA assay and then here and then VRE assay there or then the third assay there, we are thinking of creating panels that in one shot and in very powerful way can give a very high resolution of the various targets and also a sub-typing of them as well. This is the benefit of the QIAplex technology and also one of the advantages of first preliminary version we launched for researchers only in Q2. Now in terms of the launch outline, we did put some of the women's health related assays on fast track and the hospital acquired infections panel will be more in a regulated format, will be more in the second half of 2008 than the first.

Thank you very much.

Thanks.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Jason Weiss from Robert W. Baird, please go ahead.

Hi thanks for taking my call. I am wondering if you could talk little bit about perhaps some HPV contract wins that you have seen either within or outside the U.S.?

Sure, while we continue to expand our business and there were some major contracts signed in the second and the third quarter, one that was announced was certainly the expansion of our contract with Quest and we continue to see that our customers are extremely favorable to this tremendous body of data that we can bring to the table, that shows the value of these tests. And we are winning contracts almost every day or every week. So as this expands geographically, I wouldn't want to comment on individual contract, unless they're really material, but we are seeing a very strong competitive advantage for the technology and the competitive advantages of our product.

Great, thank you for that. Then with regard to gross margin, you gave some good insight as to some of the moving pieces there. I am wondering if you could provide any additional detail on the gross margin of the core QIAGEN business during Q3.

On our core QIAGEN... hi Jason, I think we have a growth... we have seen I think good quarter. We have clearly had a strong instrument quarter as well which as you know clearly has an impact on gross margin, but as I said before, it doesn't have any impact on operational income and on EPS as we benefit some on the tax side. So overall I would say a slight improvement on the call it legacy QIAGEN gross margin, but I think a big impact was really that we... for accounting purposes where we had some reclassification between legacy QIAGEN and QIAGEN accounting policies. And therefore you will see a... you have seen a slight impact in the third quarter, but of course as I said, you will see an improvement already going into the fourth quarter, of course having three months of QIAGEN within our consolidation, certainly has impacted growth.

Great, thank you. Roland.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Maykin Ho with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Hi. I don't know whether I missed this. I think in the past you've broken down your business based on research, molecular diagnostics etcetera. So what is the breakdown for this quarter?

Yes thanks Maykin. Well the breakdown is a little bit difficult and misleading, because we didn't have a full quarter. On an apples of the Digene business being consolidated here, I would take as the best basis the numbers that we put out in the second quarter in which the molecular diagnostic business about 48% of our sales and you should consider that also as the target number for this quarter. But again we only consolidated two quarters of Digene and that's why this percentage number we thought of it, but it would have been little bit misleading if we put in. So no major changes, use the second quarter number the guidance for what we have in the third quarter, if that's okay.

Sure. If I do a quick calculation here that's about $85 million in molecular diagnostics, granted this is only about two months of Digene. But if you do the calculation in second quarter molecular diagnostics is $65 million, for instance $20 million for the two months, is that the right way to think about that?

Roland.

Yes, I think if you do that on an apple-on-apple basis, you would probably see that for the third quarter... put it differently in the fourth quarter you will probably see that molecular diagnostics will be around 48% of total revenues, for the third quarter was around 42% because of the two months Digene consolidation.

So if the math is correct then the two months is only $20 million?

No, that is something wrong with your math.

Maybe incorrect?

We guided for numbers around $40 million in HPV related business and as I said before, we were well in or exceeded that number.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Dan Leonard of First Analysis, please go ahead.

Good afternoon. Peer on the hospital acquired infection panel, could you give me some insight into how a multi-target panel like that may be reimbursed?

Yes we have some interesting ideas in this space. I'd say it's a excellent question Dan and that one which is very important. If I may, I would like to keep that little bit under lid and try to give you little bit detail on that in February. But we see this is actually an extremely important opportunity because it could also significantly lead to a cost reduction in the system and as we're seeing the need for broader based analytical, broad based testing.

Okay thanks. And then my second question, can you give me an update on the progress of your HPV patent litigation?

Yes, sure. Well we really don't comment on ongoing litigations, and I know lot of other people who have been doing that and the information has all been a little bit misleading. Maybe for instance say that QIAGEN has the most extensive HPV intellectual property positioning in the world, and we remain extremely committed to enforcing this position. But in terms of specifics, we do not as a policy comment on any pending litigation and ongoing litigation. And this IP portfolio is only one of very many significant barriers to entry in the HPV testing market. And again, I see a lot of data around HPV testing where analytical performances are being looked at. What is important is the clinical performance and this is where, probably the most significant barrier kicks in. And we have a, however, a very clear position that we will defend our IP positions very actively going forward and nothing has changed on that. We are looking forward. Our strategy is very straightforward and we are moving full steam on it.

Okay. Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Eric Criscuolo [ph] with Thomas Weisel Partners, please go ahead.

Hi thank you for taking my questions filling in for Peter Lawson here. I was just wondering, can you comment on what the organic growth for your instruments were at this quarter?

Well Ronald, do want to take that?

Absolutely, I think the organic growth was around 10% and I think there was not such significant difference, maybe just looking on the details here between consumables and instruments, so both are around approximately 10%.

Okay, 10% great thanks. And also as far as the sales force integration is going, can you maybe comment on what maybe your biggest concern is, regarding the integration on maybe what you could possibly see as a hurdle that you have to overcome for that to go smoothly?

Well I think whichever integration, the most important thing is the people behind the companies and the organizations that are coming together and are working as one. And we are placing a significant emphasis on integrating the cultures and also the people. And this has been very successful especially on the last... about the last six weeks since we were able to announce the organizations and the roles and responsibilities. This is something that we are putting a very high emphasis on. In terms of the integration of the sales forces, we are actually getting a fantastic feedback from the sales teams. First of all the sales teams have a broad portfolio they can now talk about and also create very interesting discussions with the customers across the number of different products and at the same time our legacy sales force has a product at line which is extremely important for so many laboratories that they talk to. So that integration on the sales side will be completed by the end of this year, and we expect to operate under the new, under the new structures we saw it here starting in January. And it is different country by country, and that's really the challenge to balance the right mix between physician and laboratory sales force and then leverage everything with advocacy and DTC marketing which... this mix is almost in every country very different and finding that off to more mix is one thing that we're working very intensely on.

Okay great. Thank you very much.

Thanks.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Patrick Fuchs with DZ Bank, please go.

Hello, I have a question regarding HPV testing in China as their cytology infrastructure is not so well developed than in western countries. So I still see... are you already seeing there picking up phase or what are your activities there? And will it be more obvious in let's say an HPV growth rate in 2008? Thank you.

Excellent question Patrick. China is as we know very important market for QIAGEN, we are market leader in molecular testing in China. And this is a market that is very open to HPV testing and especially to the solutions we have to offer. We have already been offering HPV tests, the legacy QIGEN business previously on a real time PCR basis but the legacy Digene technology is simply far superior in terms of the clinical validation and also the performance of the product. So we're getting great feedback on this, and the integration of our businesses in China is actually one which is at very high priority. What is very interesting in China is we have... there were announcements previously from the legacy Digene organization that they had a product in the pipeline that had been co-financed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that allows HPV testing to go into very rural settings. And this is certainly a product area that you'll hear more from going forward as we talk about rolling out HPV testing into developing countries linking HPV testing around the developed world versions with disseminatable solutions that we can use in rural setting. It's very important politically and something that we look forward to leveraging going forward.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Matthew Scalo with Canaccord Adams, please go ahead.

Hi guys I just wanted a little bit of clarification here. Peer you mentioned, HPV $40 million was the expectation for the quarter. I have got in my note $36 million to $38 million I know I am splitting hairs here but you said you exceeded $40 million?

Okay. I was... sorry for the confusion here. We had given guidance for the third quarter of 36 to 38 and I said, we... I didn't give us... I said our guidance has been around 40 and we met or exceeded the guidance. So and so it's... the business is performing very well.

Okay. Thanks for that and then as far as Digene's DTC campaign in the U.S. can you comment a little bit about third quarter fourth quarter spend, possibly talk about do you anticipate continuing that in 2008 and then possibly do you anticipate doing a DTC campaign in Europe to kind of jumpstart back road there?

Sure good question. We had, we're currently analyzing our 2008 plan for DTC activity. So we continue to see this as an important factor and one that we want to use going forward as well. And the market is changing, there is increasingly awareness around HPV in general, the vaccines did their share, we can do our thing as a... we might be large as a diagnostic company but we are no match to the vaccine companies with their hundreds of millions of dollars of HPV awareness activity. And this is certainly something that we want to synchronize and leverage that more going forward. So we are looking at the 2008 plan but it will certainly be a very heavy emphasis also going forward. In Europe we have been using... we have been test driving DTC in various regions with some good success in some regions and it really depends on the local infrastructure on the reimbursement and these types of things. So also here this is part of an very important effort where we've put our very strong European infrastructure to work at optimizing the rollout of these products in 2008.

Okay, thank you guys.

Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question is coming from Alastair Mackay with GARP Research. Please go ahead.

Hi good afternoon.

Hi Alastair.

Digene has had previously disclosed that they were working on the genotyping assay which they have mentioned is HC4, can you give any insight as to whether you are pursuing the genotyping assay in HPV and whether or not we could use the Hybrid Capture Technology or perhaps whether you would migrate that assay over to another QIAGEN technology?

Sure Alastair, I think I wouldn't want to say yes or no now to your answer. Let me just tell you what we have said so far. We have a very exciting HPV genotyping product that we have on fast track and that will actually be launchable in the foreseeable future now. And this is a very powerful product that we'll be leveraging multiplexing technologies which we have some under the QIAplex technology name. These are PCR multiplexing technologies that can be detected on numerous different systems such as Luminex or others. At the same time, our innovation engine is put behind women's health in a broad way and also in the sub-segment of HPV testing in a very broad way. And we see that the market we will need many different solutions and we are committed to bring to our customers a number of different solutions in this space. And as the market leader and the technology leader we are taking this very seriously and we are going to be extremely innovative over the next few years, and also here I would like to defer some of your latter question regarding hybrid capture based genotyping to our analyst day in February.

Very good thank you. And then for Roland, I had an arithmetic question. Roland if you could say how many shares in total QIAGEN issued in the third quarter for both eGene and Digene and any other similar activities?

For Digene was around 39 million shares and eGene was around a million share. Nothing else.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. [Operator Instructions]. Our next question is coming from Peter Welford with Lehman Brothers. Please go ahead.

Hi thanks for taking my question, as there is two actually firstly on the $500 million credit facility that Roland mentioned. I am just wondering whether you can give the outline the financial terms of that and whether how long that's in place for. Second question that is just on the tax and I appreciate that it will be very difficult to outline. But just the benefits you are clearly seeing in the midst, how should we think about this going forward beyond '08? And can I just also ask for a point of clarification which is just on the 4Q EPS guidance you gave? I just tried to do the math from your full year guidance and the number of shares you've got, I think you won't stand too low in the range because I... could you expand [ph] on, just to check back, that will great? Thank you.

Hi Peter, thanks for your question. On the credit facility, the debt component for Digene acquisition was financed, as I would see it as a very favorable terms at Deutsche Bank. [indiscernible] is the five year term at total interest rate of somewhere between 575, 6% and then we have additional $150 million on revolving credit facility, which gives us some flexibility going forward. On the tax, I think going forward I think especially in 2008 as of January 1st 2008, the German tax reform will come into power and as you know that we have significant or do significant step-up of our production and value generation in Germany where there is effective tax rate as small as coming down from 38% to 30%, which means overall we probably should have an effective tax rate for QIAGEN group somewhere between 26% and 30%. And I also think there is something which will be... we feel very confident in 2008 and beyond. And on EPS I think guidance is $0.61 to $0.62 and we had shifted $0.48 within the first nine months.

Okay, thank you.

You are welcome.

Thank you. At this time I would like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Peer Schatz.

Solveigh. Do you want to...

Yes okay, thank you very much. I would like to close this conference call by thanking you all for participating. We hope to welcome you again to our full year 2008 results conference call in February 2008. If you have any additional questions please do not hesitate to contact us. Again thank you very much and have a nice day. Thank you very much, bye.

Thank you. That does conclude today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time and have a wonderful day.