Dermatrends, a US drug delivery company, has been awarded a patent
that covers the method of using bases to enhance the permeation of
amine drugs across the skin and could lead to new products for
Alzheimer's and other diseases.
West Pharmaceutical Services of the US said yesterday that it is
looking to hive off its drug delivery business and focus on its
primary business in prefilled syringes and components.
The market for generic drugs is going to expand from its present
level of $35 billion (€29bn) to $80 billion in 2008, as
cash-strapped healthcare payors turn increasingly to cheaper
options.
Dutch drug delivery company OctoPlus has licensed two
biodegradeable polymers to SurModics that can be used to coat
medical devices and deliver drugs into the surrounding tissues.
Cardinal Health has completed its $2 billion (€1.6bn) tender offer
for intravenous product and services firm Alaris Medical Systems in
a deal that could give Alaris a leg-up that will allow it to
leapfrog its competitors.
ML Laboratories of the UK has entered into an agreement to supply
an unnamed pharmaceutical company with its C200 metered dose
inhaler, designed to deliver two drugs at the same time, for use in
a new asthma product.
Canada's Generex Biotechnology has presented new evidence that its
RapidMist device can deliver proteins and peptides through the
lining of the mouth, potentially doing away with the need for
injections.
The US subsidiary of India's Ranbaxy has launched a cephalosporin
antibiotic in a chewable tablet formulation designed to be easier
to take by patients who struggle with tablets or capsules.
Sigma-Aldrich has boosted its capacity to supply pharmaceutical
ingredients with the purchase of Tetrionics, a company with a
strong position in the high growth area of high potency and
cytotoxic compounds.
Unigene, which specialises in developing oral versions of
injectable drugs, has received a $4 million (€3.3m) milestone
payment from pharmaceutical major GlaxoSmithKline for starting
clinical trials of an osteoporosis drug.
Micap, a UK company specialising in using yeast cells to
encapsulate drugs, has entered into a collaboration with leading
medicated chewing gum company Fertin that should extend the range
of active ingredients that can be delivered...
A new drug delivery company, Merrion Pharmaceuticals, has been set
up to commercialise various technologies originally developed at
Ireland's Elan, which sold off many of its assets after growing too
quickly throughout the 1990s.
Hovione of Portugal has teamed up with drug delivery company CyDex
to develop improved formulations of drugs that have lost or will
soon lose patent protection.
Vectura, a UK biotechnology company which is developing an inhaled
alternative to orally acting impotence drugs such as Pfizer's
Viagra (sildenafil), has announced plans to float on the London
stock market.
The US Food and Drug Administration has suggested removing
essential-use status for metered dose inhalers (MDIs) used to
deliver the asthma drug albuterol (salbutamol) which use
chlorofluorocarbon propellants.
US-based healthcare conglomerate Cardinal Health has stepped up its
presence in the European market with the appointment of a new
management team for the region based in the UK.
French drug delivery specialist Ethypharm has won a contract to
apply its melt-in-the-mouth Flashtab technology to two new
over-the-counter analgesic products that will be marketed in Japan
by Kowa.
Despite advances made in sustained delivery drug delivery
technologies in recent years, a problem still persists in trying to
obtain controlled release of a wide variety of medications that
have only a narrow absorption window in...
Drug re-engineering company Eiffel Technologies will add to its
existing project in improving insulin delivery with the start of
clinical trials of an in-house product early next year, writes
Wai Lang Chu.
Innercap Technologies has developed a new capsule drug delivery
system that makes it possible to combine two incompatible drug
compounds into a single dosage unit.
German generics producer Schwarz Pharma has licensed rights to a
drug delivery technology developed by US company Lipocine, to
revamp its pipeline in the face of competitive threats to its
biggest product.
Occam International of the Netherlands has licensed its coating
technology to Xtent, a company specialising in the development of
cardiovascular stents that deliver drugs directly into the blood
vessels.
Banner Pharmaceuticals has developed a new oral delivery
formulation that is designed to make it easier to dose drugs to
children and the elderly and to take medications on the go,
writes Phil Taylor.
US drug delivery company SCOLR has been knocked back by the
decision by one of its partners not to go ahead with a project
based on its technology. But the company insists it will go it
alone in tackling the pharmaceutical sector.
A new company has been set up in the UK to apply high-throughput
technologies to the development of new chemical materials,
including catalysts and novel drugs, for use in the pharmachem
industries.
UK drug delivery specialist SkyePharma received another welcome
boost yesterday with the news that its new formulation of morphine
had been approved in the US.
The needle-free injector technology underpinning PowderJect, the
drug delivery company which shot onto the biotechnology scene in
the mid-1990s and was snapped up by Chiron of the US last year,
will form the foundation of a new therapeutic...
India's Dr Reddy's Laboratories has acquired a US company that
brings in a proprietary drug delivery technology that could be
applied across a whole range of dermatological products.
Acusphere has developed microcapsule a technology that promises to
improve the delivery of a range of drugs, including those that are
poorly-soluble in water. The technology is being used to develop a
sustained-release version of...
Profile Therapeutics of the UK has been granted approval from the
US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for Prodose, its nebuliser
system that can improve the delivery of inhaled drugs.
St Louis, USA-based KV Pharmaceutical says that the US District
Court for the District of Minnesota has denied a motion for a
preliminary injunction by two rival drug delivery companies in a
patent dispute centring on its technology...
A formulation of the steroid drug budesonide, made using a
solubility technology developed by US company CyDex, has
outperformed one of the leading drugs for asthma on the market in a
preclinical study.
US company Globe Medical Tech has started production of a new type
of safety syringe developed by Maxxon that should cost no more than
a regular, non-safe disposable syringe.
Novartis Consumer Health has launched two of its OTC flu remedies
in portable dissolvable strips, thought to be the first such
products to use the novel delivery format.
Ireland's Elan Corp has signed up another heavyweight partner -
Switzerland's Roche - for its NanoCrystals technology, designed to
improve the solubility of drug compounds.
US water-soluble films company MonoSol has bought the UK division
of Aquafilm, giving it access to substantial manufacturing
capabilities in Europe and its range of edible films, report
Phil Taylor and Dominique Patton.
The US Food and Drug Administration is planning to hold a meeting
in June to re-examine its regulations on electronic records and
signatures, used to generate the audit trail in the food and drug
industries, to examine whether some...
US company NeoPharm believes it may have overcome one of the major
limitations of using RNA interference (RNAi) or gene silencing as a
systemic treatment.
Researchers in the US have developed a drug delivery technology
that could improve the treatment of cancer, avoid side effects and
even report back on the success of treatment.
Access Pharmaceuticals has signed an agreement with an unnamed US
partner for a drug delivery system based on nanoparticle aggregates
that can be used to formulate proteins that are degraded by
solvents.
Debiopharm of Switzerland has won approval for a three-month depot
formulation of Pamorelin (triptorelin pamoate), a drug to treat
prostate cancer, based on its proprietary polymer-based drug
delivery technology.
Researchers in the US have developed a way of self-assembling
liposomes - lipid particles used to carry a drug payload - that are
smaller and more uniform in size than can be achieved using current
methods.
Belgium's UCB has been granted approval in the US for the first
chewable formulation of an antihistamine designed to make it easier
to treat children for hayfever.
Researchers in the Netherlands say that a steroid drug formulated
in a lipid droplet and coated with a polymer seems to be more
effective in treating rheumatoid arthritis than the steroid on its
own.
BioProgress of the UK, which makes cellulose based films for
coating tablets and capsules, is planning to buy a company which
would provide a rapid route to increase production capacity in the
US, and also accelerate the development...
A new inhaled formulation of insulin that could do away with the
need for diabetics to inject themselves before meals has been filed
for approval in Europe by Aventis and Pfizer and the dossier
accepted by the European Medicines Evaluation...
A partnership between two US companies is aiming to exploit the
discovery that short pulses or bursts of antibiotic treatment are
more effective than continuous exposure in fighting bacterial
infections.
Microencapsulation specialist Micap has made its first foray into
the pharmaceutical sector after clinching a licensing deal with UK
drug delivery specialist SkyePharma.
Crosslinking is a natural phenomenon occurring in gelatin that negatively impacts soft capsules, reducing their stability and prolonging their dissolution...
New classes and indications of orally inhaled therapeutics are rapidly expanding, with the development pipeline increasingly featuring both large and small...
Invivo: Many orally dosed APIs are bioavailable only when formulated as an enteric dosage form to protect them from the harsh environment of the stomach....