HEALTH CARE

InVitro Seeks Financing: Nearby, InVitro International Inc. in Irvine is having its own growing pains, albeit much more painful ones.

InVitro, which manufactures diagnostic kits for skin- and eye-care companies who don’t want to use animals in laboratory testing, said it may be closing shop permanently--unless it can land some much-needed financing.

Bill Curtis, InVitro chief financial officer, said the company is “still very much in the development phase.”

So much so that the 7-year-old company has had a major cash-flow problem.

InVitro, which uses vegetable-based formulas to evaluate eye and skin irritability, has been losing money since it went public in May, 1991. For the first nine months of its fiscal year, ending June 30, the company lost a whopping $3.6 million on revenue of $1 million. The fiscal year ends in September.

InVitro had given a private investors’ group 21 days to work out a deal for $3 million to $4 million, either through an equity stake or a loan, to tide the company over until better days. But, Curtis said, that time period has expired with no financing agreement.

So the company, while still negotiating with that as-yet-unidentified group, is now knocking on other doors in order to escape its financial woes.

Whoever eventually bails InVitro out had better do it quick, Curtis said.

“We need financing in order to continue the operations,” he said. “Without additional financing at some point, we may have to cease or at least curtail operations soon.”