Investments in CMO activities: round up

02-Jul-2012 - Last updated on 03-Jul-2012 at 12:20 GMT

Outsourcing-Pharma.com presents a round-up of the latest contract manufacturing investments, including new screening services for Imaxio, Encap’s renewed push for its CMO biz, and Pernix’s bid to take over Great Southern Laboratories.

Imaxio has boosted its high-throughput screening services after acquiring Agilent’s Bravo automated liquid handling platform into its systems.

The firm says the move will allow it to process bigger batches of nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) more quickly.

Speaking to Outsourcing-Pharma.com, Imaxio’s director of genomics Veronique Vidal said the tech will also allow for greater flexibility.

She said: “The equipment provides flexible configurations for different protocols particularly for targeted sequencing samples (192 per week), generates highly reproducible data and reliability.”

Vidal also hinted that more similar investments could be on the horizon, saying that “adding new sequencing technology and increasing sequencing capacity,” is the name of the game.

Encap Drug Delivery has launched a $2m (€1.58m) capital expenditure (CAPEX) programme to boost its CMO (contract manufacturing organisation) activities.

The funds will go towards new product mixing and capsule filling equipment, including the Esco Labor (EL200) mixer and a high speed Bosch filling machine (GKF2500L) and weight checker (KKE2500).

The new additions mean that from 2013, the firm will be able to produce over 6m capsules per day.

Expansions for the company follow reports of a 20 per cent uptick in sales for its manufacturing over the past two years, with further growth still predicted from 2012-14.

CEO Stephen Brown said: “We are seeing a growing interest in our commercial manufacturing capabilities and we have discussions progressing with a number of companies on their late stage Phase III products.

“Encap is investing to make sure that we have the best facilities and the most advanced manufacturing technology available to meet the needs of these new customers over the coming months and years.”

Pernix Therapeutics Holdings has agreed to a $4.9m takeover of Texas, US, based liquids, tablets and capsules maker Great Southern Laboratories.

The firm hopes the deal will increase its generics manufacturing capacity as well as helping the development of new products.

The acquisition is expected to reach completion at the end of this month.

Cooper Collins, president and CEO of Pernix, said: "This acquisition of Great Southern is another important investment in the future growth of Pernix, which will enable us to develop products more rapidly and provide in-house product development expertise.

“We plan to utilize this facility to manufacture certain products currently marketed by Pernix, as well as future branded, generic and OTC products, as we continue to expand and diversify our product portfolio."