Under the deal, the contract research organisation (CRO) will pick up JSW’s Phase II- IV drug development services for pharma and biotech firms specialising in the central nervous system (CNS) therapy area.
It will also extend QPS Netherlands’ late-stage site-monitoring capability across Central and Eastern Europe, as well as providing additional project management capabilities.
The move is one of the firm’s only forays into late phase takeovers in recent years, with a focus largely on pre-clinical and early phase bids.
Purchases included pre-clinical testing firm Taiwan’s Center of Toxicology and Preclinical Sciences (CTPS), Indian Phase I and bioanaltytics company Bioserve, and Netherlands-based Phase I provider Xendo.
The agreement however, is still not a total departure from QPS’s recent pre-clinical preference – JSW also provides preclinical efficacy studies including in vitro molecular and cellular analysis.
It claims to be the “only company that can combine behavioural analysis, brain neurochemistry and biochemistry as well as quantitative histology and histopathology into preclinical research.”
When Outsourcing-Pharma.com asked why it chose to expand, QPS failed to comment.
However in a statement, CEO Ben Chien said the acquisition is the latest in a line of purchases which expands its fuller “cross-border” offering.
“Clients all over the world will now have access to an even wider range of the exceptional services they have come to expect from QPS, along with an expanding global footprint,” he said.
JSW’s CEO Manfred Windisch also said the time is right for CNS research, as with increasing life expectancy across the world the conditions – such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and stroke – are also going up.
“Integrating JSW with QPS will afford us more global exposure and market competitiveness, and also allow us to offer complete services from preclinical to clinical,” he said.
JSW also failed to comment on the acquisition.