Nitto Denko Avecia to buy Irvine and Avrio to expand offering

Nucleic acid manufacturer Nitto Denko Avecia has agreed to buy Irvine Pharmaceutical Services and Avrio Biopharmaceuticals in deals designed to expand its production business.

Nitto said the deal – financial terms of which were not disclosed – will add Irvine’s analytical capabilities and Avrio’s contract drug and active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) production operations to its own nucleic acid manufacturing business.

Nitto president, Detlef Rethage, said: “We will work to realize the synergies between the three businesses by offering seamless outsourcing solutions for the benefit of our customers, including oligonucleotide drug substance, drug product, analytical development and related services."

This was echoed by Assad Kazeminy, CEO of Irvine and Avrio, who said: “This combination provides an exciting expansion of breadth of capabilities and depth of expertise to support the growing needs of the pharmaceutical, biopharmaceutical and medical device industries."

Avrio’s customer base includes Hemispherx, which hired it to make its RNA-based chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) therapy Ampligen (rintatolimod) In August.