Under the agreement, the companies will offer a wider range of drug discovery and translational medicine services, though the focus will be mostly on immunology, and will include expanded profiling and molecule testing, particularly in the context of regulatory studies.
Manuela Leone, president of Harlan Contract Research Services, told us in an exclusive interview that Harlan decided rather than expand internally that a partnership was the way to go for moving further into the early drug development market.
Through the alliance, Harlan aims to strengthen its drug discovery and translational medicine offerings utilizing Bertin Pharma’s expertise in immunology and biomarkers.
“Every company knows that the current pipelines are almost dry as far as NCEs [new chemical entities] are concerned,” Leone told Outsourcing-pharma.com
Drug development
And although one of Harlan’s specialties has been its contract breeding business, which recently expanded in the EU, the company is looking to push further into the other side of its business - early drug development.
Bertin also seems upbeat on the prospects of this new partnership.
“PharmImmune, our joint offer with the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), is the perfect example of an innovative tool that we will be able to better utilize through our agreement with Harlan CRS,” said Pascal Clayette, head of the immuno-pharmacology department at Bertin Pharma.
“If we talk about drug delivery – Harlan is building a very strong pipeline of services and as an added value, we bring fast turnaround times and the added value of being a smaller company that offers advantages that some of the larger CROs can’t offer,” Leone said.
“We can offer easy to reach scientists and services,” she added.