Colorcon takes on Chr. Hansen's excipient and coating division

While the move by Chr. Hansen reflected the company's decision to focus on other, more food and nutritional oriented areas of its business model, Colorcon's new acquisition would expand the company's global product offerings in both the pharmaceutical and nutritional markets. Chr. Hansen North America president David Carpenter said in a statement: "As we continue to review our business strategies with a determined focus on growth in the areas of cultures and enzymes, colours and flavours, we realised the excipients and coating business was not within these core areas. ​​"Thus, we decided to divest the excipients and coating business in order to further strengthen our expertise in developing and supplying cultures, dairy enzymes, natural colours and flavours to the food and nutritional industries." ​ Colorcon, which already provides a range of film-coatings and excipients to customers, would acquire through the agreement the products NU-Tab a compressible sugars, Cal-Carb calcium carbonate, and sugar spheres. Colorcon also takes on the production facility in Stoughton, Wisconsin. NU-Tab is used in a wide range of chewable applications, including children's vitamins and medications and for taste masking bitter or unpleasant drugs. Carl-Carb is an excipient for use in conventional tablets as well as calcium and mineral supplement products. Meanwhile, sugar spheres are used primarily in controlled-release formulations, providing consistent drug release over time. The coating systems produced at the facility include clear tablet coatings, which are polymer coatings on tablets to improve swallowability, improve machinery flow-through, and to add an extra layer of strength to prevent tablet degradation. The facility also produces colour and white tablet coatings used by manufacturers to spray on tablets for identification of medicine or vitamins or simply for aesthetic purposes. Colorcon expects to accelerate new product development efforts, as well as improve existing solutions for controlled release, according to a statement released by the company. "We're excited about this opportunity to expand Colorcon's product offerings and leverage our global distribution, technical service and sales infrastructure,"​ Colorcon president and chief executive William Motzer said in a statement. Colorcon already produces the film coatings Opadry II, Opaglos 2, Opadry fx, and Opadry ​AMB, which provide coatings that are more economical and increase brand identity. In March, Colorcon struck a deal with chemical manufacturer Dow which saw Colorcon taking on the responsibility for global marketing, sales, technical service and development and distribution of Dow pharmaceutical products for use in oral controlled release applications.