Last week in pharma… 5th August

ramarketing news round-up 

AES launches OMNI™ Electric Utility Raceway, Samsung and GreenLight Biosciences announce strategic partnership and Recipharm to develop two inhalation formulations for Transpire Bio, and more!

AES Clean Technology launches OMNI™ Electric Utility Raceway

AES Clean Technology, a leading provider of high-performance cleanroom facilities within the pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industry, announces the launch of its smart cable management system for cleanrooms – the AES OMNI™ Electric Utility Raceway.

The OMNI™ Electric Utility Raceway is an expansion from its sister product, the OMNI™ Gas Utility Raceway. It was created to ensure a smoother cleanroom delivery for AES Clean Technology’s partners.

Grant Merrill, CEO of AES Clean Technology, said: “The OMNI™ Electric Utility Raceway was created based on our partners’ feedback, who found success using our sister product in their cleanroom. We strongly believe it is the cleanest approach to electrical utility access in the industry, and look forward to hearing more from our partners on the success of the product within their facilities.”

GreenLight Biosciences and Samsung Biologics complete first commercial-scale engineering run for mRNA Covid-19 vaccine

Biopharma published an article: GreenLight Biosciences and Samsung Biologics have completed the first commercial-scale engineering run under the companies’ mRNA production partnership: ahead of a COVID-19 vaccine booster clinical trial due to start later this year. 

The two companies announced a strategic partnership in late 2021, with South Korean CDMO Samsung Biologics taking on manufacturing duties for Boston-based GreenLight Bioscience’s mRNA COVID-19 vaccine. Since then, tech transfer and scale-up from the lab bench to Samsung’s commercial facility has been completed in seven months, ‘demonstrating platform adaptability and scalability’. GreenLight’s process – from drug substance and lipid nanoparticle formulation to bulk drug product – can be completed in the same facility, an important capability. 

GreenLight’s mRNA synthesis reaction had a titer of 12g/L at commercial scale and produced 650g of mRNA. A clinical trial for the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine as a booster is expected to start this year, and the trial has shown the companies can supply the vaccine at commercial scale. A second engineering run will start in August, to implement improvements indicated by the first run and to demonstrate repeatability at scale.

Recipharm to develop two inhalation formulations for Transpire Bio

According to OINDP news Florida-based startup Transpire Bio announced that it has signed an agreement with Recipharm for development of two inhaled candidates, TRB-1 and TRB-2, for the treatment of asthma and COPD. The company says that the two generic MDIs are “intended for advanced markets.”

Transpire CEO Xian-Ming Zeng said, “Our mission is to improve access to important, life-saving inhaled therapies, and to introduce new inhaled therapies to help address areas of significant unmet medical need. TRB-1 and TRB-2 are our first offerings in development which will help improve access for potentially millions of patients. We are very excited to be working with Recipharm to advance these important medicines.”

Over 100,000 monkeypox vaccines procured, government says

According to the BBC last month the NHS stepped up its monkeypox vaccination programme in England as infections rose.

Vaccines minister Maggie Throup said the majority of vaccines were being made available in London, with about 75% of confirmed cases in the capital. But she urged people to wait to be invited to receive their jabs.

The latest figures show that nationally there have been 2,436 confirmed cases, with 1,778 of those in London.

Biotech M&A, is picking back up. Here are the latest deals.

According to Biopharmadive in the business of drug development, deals can be just as important as scientific breakthroughs. Many of today’s most influential medicines, from the life-saving cancer treatment Keytruda to the anti-inflammatory agent Humira, might not have become so without mergers and acquisitions.

Over the last few years, pharmaceutical M&A hit record highs as larger companies turned again and again to young biotechs for innovation. Often, these deals focused on cancer, rare diseases and immune system disorders — areas of drug research that were seeing major victories in clinical trials and huge profits for treatments that made it to market.

These deals haven’t come cheap, however. Biotech companies have had an easy time raising huge sums of money from private investors and, until recently, the public markets. That funding can make them less receptive to a buyout offer and force would-be acquirers to offer more to lock down deals. Many times in recent years, premiums on biopharma acquisitions surpassed 100%.

Lab shortage could curb science boom

There are almost no laboratories left to rent in the science clusters of Oxford and Cambridge, according to data from property consultancy Bidwells cited in the Financial Times. The lab shortage could prevent the academic powerhouses from capitalising on the life sciences boom that they are currently witnessing, with investors warning that some firms are being driven to the likes of Boston in the US where there are millions of square feet available.

“The government has grand ambitions to transform Britain into a scientific superpower, but the Oxford-Cambridge arc is at threat of becoming a victim of its own meteoric rise, with the unicorns of tomorrow increasingly being locked out of mission-critical R&D space,” Sue Foxley, research director at Bidwells, told the FT. 

Many companies are being left with no choice but to lease office and other commercial space, before converting it into laboratories, Foxley added. 

To read more

Getting proactive with pharma packaging

According to PharmTech pharmaceutical packaging is a multifaceted segment, providing essential protection for the important and sensitive materials housed within, while also delivering key information and advertising to patients. According to market research, the pharmaceutical packaging sector is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of 7.4% between 2022 and 2031, reaching an estimated $178.8 billion by the end of the forecast period.

Factors driving the growth of the pharmaceutical packaging market include a developing preference for single-dose packaging formats, a rise in drug development in general, and the growth of e-Commerce. Obviously, the COVID‑19 pandemic has impacted the whole bio/pharma industry, but given the rapid approval of the therapies to tackle the virus, such as the messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines, drug packaging very quickly became a priority issue.

Crown Bioscience names Michael Prosser as chief business officer

According to Contract Pharma Crown Bioscience, a JSR Life Sciences company, has restructured its commercial leadership team by creating a new Chief Business Officer (CBO) role and with additional investment in commercial talent.

Effective immediately, Michael Prosser is promoted to Chief Business Officer. Prosser has been with Crown Bioscience for over ten years serving in a variety of operational and commercial leadership positions, and most recently served as Senior Vice President, Commercial and Strategic Development.