Round up of M&A in pharma contract services

18-Apr-2011 - Last updated on 19-Apr-2011 at 09:31 GMT

Outsourcing-Pharma presents a round up of contract services merger and acquisition activity, including deals at Evotec, Vyteris and Avantium Pharma.

Germany-based Evotec has closed the acquisition of Kinaxo Biotechnologies, a drug discovery alliance business. Completion of the deal gives Evotec access to technologies in drug discovery, efficacy, response predication, and safety assessment.

Kinaxo has particular expertise in oncology. Its portfolio includes technologies for: determining the cellular activity of kinase inhibitors; understanding of drug modes-of-action in vivo; and identifying possible off-target side effects early in discovery and development.

Evotec paid an initial €12m ($17m) to acquire Kinaxo. Speaking when the deal was made public, Axel Ullrich, co-founder of Kinaxo, said: “The integration of [Kinaxo’s] leading drug discovery capability will implement Evotec as a driver towards personalised medicine in the future.”

Drug delivery patch maker Vyteris has closed its merger with MediSync BioServices. Following completion of the deal MediSync, a company focused on consolidating niche contract research organisations (CRO), has become a fully-owned subsidiary of Vyteris.

MediSync was founded in 2006 with the goal of creating a cluster of dermatology CROs, site management organisations (SMO) and related businesses. Since then MediSync has made one acquisition and plans to close further deals in 2011 and 2012.

Haro Hartounian, CEO at Vyteris, said: “MediSync's current and possible future operations intend to potentially serve a growing demand for outsourced clinical research and related services as drug and medical device developers may be attracted to the efficiency and flexibility.”

Pre-formulation CRO Crystallics has been created by a management buyout. The CRO, which has been operating for 11 years, was part of Avantium Holdings but has now been spun out.

Gunnar Staaf, CEO, said: “Crystallics’ core business focus will be in solid state research and pre-formulation, an area where we have built up considerable expertise over the last decade.”