Court Square, a provider of IT service offerings for both large and
small biopharma firms, has seized upon what it saw as a gap in the
market to open up a dedicated life sciences division for small and
medium-sized companies (SMEs).
The damages caused by a patent dispute can sometimes wipe out the
assets side of a company's balance sheet - a potential death
sentence for small or medium companies - many of which aren't doing
enough to protect themselves,...
Italian packaging and processing machinery company IMA Group has
posted a net profit of €13m for 2005, down 24 per cent from 2004,
since a rise in revenues was offset by one-off charges, operating
costs and a reduction in prices as...
US filtration giant Millipore is pumping more resources into its
personnel and facilities in Asia, as outsourcing trends and new
laboratory investments in emerging markets such as China and India
are upping demand for its bioscience...
Spending up to $400m (€330m), Indian drugmaker Ranbaxy has ended
the week with three acquisitions of European generic companies
under its belt, hoping a strong foothold in Europe will help it
offset its declining fortunes in the US.
As pharma companies tighten their belts, they are expecting more
and more cost savings from their outsourcing providers. IT services
company HCL Technologies spoke to Outsourcing-Pharma.com at
Interphex in New York to explain how...
No company likes to hire and fire unnecessarily. When used
correctly, outsourcing can be the key to maintaining the proper
balance of fixed and variable staffing and allow the right staffing
resources to be rapidly shifted to the...
Dutch biotechnology firm Crucell has announced it will sell vaccine
manufacturer Rhein Biotech to US company Dynavax for around $12m
(€10m) as it chooses to focus on specialised vaccines such as those
for Ebola and malaria.
The Optima Group's presence at this year's Interphex show in New
York was significant as it gave In-PharmaTechnologist.com the first
look at the Group's recently implemented shift in focus, resulting
in a product range...
inVentiv Health (Formerly Ventiv Health) saw its fourth quarter
profits dive in 2005 by 37 per cent after being hit by higher
interest expenses and an income tax provision, however, the company
managed to increase its sales for the...
Rapid growth in the biopharmaceutical sector in China, India and
Southeast Asia has prompted US filtration specialist Pall to devote
more resources and industry experts to these regions, as the 14 per
cent growth seen in its BioPharm...
Looking to establish itself in Eastern Europe, French drug maker
Sanofi-Aventis has bought a 24.9 per cent stake in Czech generic
drug firm Zentiva for $514.7m (€430m).
Organon, Akzo Nobel's healthcare division, has conceded it will
have to close its Diosynth manufacturing plant in Scotland by the
end of the year since it cannot divest it, as the unit's lack of
competitiveness in the production...
The Pharmaceutical Institute, provider of specialised knowledge for
the pharma industry, is now providing custom research services to
cater for those with complex research needs.
Ventiv Health has spent the last month buying up companies. After
buying Aheris in February, the company has since agreed to acquire
US clinical services provider Synergos, as well as Canadian
healthcare marketing and communications...
As a fever of consolidation continues to sweep the generics market,
Iceland's Actavis Group has offered to buy out Croatian rival Pliva
in a proposal which values it at $1.6bn (€1.31bn) and aims to
create the world's third...
Chemical companies Solvay and Akzo Nobel have coughed up $72.8m
(€59.7m) to settle a lawsuit from the US Justice Department while
having to plead guilty of fixing prices for sodium perborate, an
oxidising agent used mainly in detergents,...
Canadian drug outsourcing company Patheon has reported its first
quarterly loss since its inception in 1974, swinging from a net
profit of $6m (€4.9m) in Q1 of 2005 to a net loss of $11.5m in Q1
of 2006, as problems with production...
Oracle has introduced a new software program to help pharma
companies integrate clinical data from multiple sources and
streamline regulatory compliance in the clinical development
process. Pharma giant Boehringer Ingelheim is the...
Medidata Solutions, a global provider of e-clinical data capture,
management and reporting solutions, benefited from the drive from
paper to electronic technology in clinical trials, picking up
several lucrative contracts and expanding...
Filtration systems specialist Pall's net profit barely moved in Q2
compared to the similar period last year, up only $400,000
(€331,328) to $32.4m, still its Biopharmaceuticals business, driven
by a steady demand in consumables,...
Looking for an advantage in the high-value generics market and a
boost to its contract development services for research-driven
pharmaceutical companies, Swiss chemicals and pharmaceuticals group
Schweizerhall has bought German drug...
In its first venture outside the subcontinent, though certainly not
the last of its kind for India pharma companies, contract
pharmaceuticals manufacturer Kemwell has bought for an undisclosed
sum Pfizer's production plant in...
A $30.1m drop in licence and research revenue and the expensive
removal by rebel shareholders of its former CEO Gerard Soula last
June have taken drug delivery company Flamel from a net profit of
$12.5m (€10.3m) in 2004 to a net loss...
As the outsourcing craze continues to sweep the pharma industry,
those participating should learn the secrets to establishing and
managing successful outsourcing relationships and be aware of the
key legal issues. A new guide to pharma...
Anticipating a US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval this
year, Dendreon has awarded Diosynth Biotechnology with a long-term
contract to supply the recombinant protein antigen component of its
novel vaccine for prostate cancer...
Despite a 3 per cent drop in sales to SFr8.181bn (€5.212bn),
specialty chemicals maker Clariant has posted a 29 per cent rise in
net profit for 2005 to SFr192m, thanks to lower interest charges,
currency gains and lower taxes, but...
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has linked its
Counterfeit Alert Network (CAN) to SafeMeds Alert System, an
electronic mailing list backed by pharmaceutical manufacturers that
sends warnings about fake drugs to anyone who...
Reforms do not come cheap, certainly not for Croatian
pharmaceutical company Pliva, whose strategy of abandoning its
proprietary drugs in favour of generics may pay off in the long
term, but, along with manufacturing consolidation...
The ReNeuron Group has announced it has completed the scale-up and
cell banking of its lead stem cell product for stroke, which gives
the Company the potential to progress this therapy without the need
to re-derive the cells from...
With a 30 per cent grip on the $100m (€84m) global customer
relationship management (CRM) market from its dealings in the US,
C3i is now taking on Europe - a market that holds similar potential
to the US - and finding little competition...
Its upcoming inhalable insulin drug may prove a blockbuster but
Nektar's 2005 results brought the biopharmaceutical company further
in the red, with a net loss of $108.2m (€91m) in Q4 more than five
times higher than the $19.3m...
Swiss custom manufacturing firm Lonza has entered into a joint
venture with investment management company Bio*One Capital to built
a $250m (€210m) large-scale mammalian cell culture plant in
Singapore, underlying Lonza's confidence...
AstraZeneca has pulled the plug on a long-running service contract
with PDI, adding another blow to the company who last week reported
a dive from profit to loss in 2005, with a net loss of nearly $20m
(€16m), versus net income of...
Last week's approval of Erbitux in the US breaks a 30-year drought
in treatments for head and neck cancer, a disease that kills 11,000
people in the US each year. Pharma giant Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS)
and biotech company ImClone...
Life sciences firm Cambrex has reported a $140.3m (€116.7m) loss in
Q4 as opposed to a profit of $4.9m in Q4 last year, hit by lower
long-term profitability projections for its Biopharma unit, as
biotech companies seem to lose their...
Japan's fourth-largest pharmaceutical company, Eisai, has announced
plans for a new pharmaceutical production and formulation research
and development facility in North Carolina in anticipation of its
parenteral and intravenous...
Rising prices globally have helped Dutch chemicals manufacturer DSM
go back to profit in Q4, up to €112m (€134m) from €3m in the red a
year ago, with operating profits in its Life Science division
almost doubling to €39m, albeit thanks...
Dutch life science firm PharmaCell has hired quality control
specialist Sensitech for the cold chain management of their cell
culture products, allowing it to ensure compliance with GMP
regulations.
India is suddenly a safer place to research and manufacture
pharmaceuticals, thanks to legal reform, raised manufacturing
standards and reduced bureaucracy. But risk still lurks in the
loopholes and protectionism.
Looking to expand the outsourcing services it provides,
AmerisourceBergen has snapped up Canadian drug distributor Asenda
and British pharmaceutical contract-packaging manufacturer Brecon,
indicating the aggressive strengthening of...
2005 was a challenging year for contract sales organisations (CSO),
with many downsizing their sales teams. However, In2Focus, is
bucking the industry trend, and increasing its headcount to meet
demand.
French firms PCAS and Proteus have decided to pool their expertise
to create a new biotech company which will provide APIs and
intermediates on a large scale, looking to offer new products and
also capitalise on the growing demand...
Britain's Department of Health has awarded healthcare company
Baxter and biotech firm Chiron two contracts worth £33m (€48m) in
total for the production of around 3.5m doses of H5N1 influenza
vaccine, underlying how worldwide...
Singapore's Ministry of Trade & Industry (MTI) will commit
$7.5bn (€63.1bn) over the next five years to drive R&D growth
in key industry areas such as biomedical science and increase
national R&D spending to 3 per...
India is emerging as a powerhouse of pharmaceutical R&D. Backed
by a scientist president and with an army of talented scientists,
the country now has R&D capacity second only to the US, at
one-fifth of the cost.
An insatiable Asian appetite for cell biology products has made
Fisher Scientific's cell-culture unit expand its Beijing facility,
making it the first non-native business to offer large-scale
liquid-media manufacturing in China.
If you're a big pharma company, outsourcing the writing of medical
publications is not the way to go, according to a report by
pharmaceutical business intelligence firm Cutting Edge Information.
