Business digest

Researchers at the UK’s Manchester Institute of Biotechnology and the Institute for Protein Design (Seattle, Washington, US) have launched an initiative designed to transform bioengineering for industrial applications. The International Centre for Enzyme Design brings together leading research teams to establish an integrated platform for developing a new generation of biocatalysts. The new centre has been awarded £1.2m in grants and is led by Professor Anthony Green. It will use deep-learning protein design tools to accelerate the development of new biocatalysts for use in essential industries such as pharmaceuticals and advanced fuel technologies.

German biotech Medigene and Chinese CRDMO WuXi Biologics have entered into a three-year, multi-target strategic partnership to design and co-research T cell receptor (TCR)-guided T Cell Engagers (TCR-TCEs) for the treatment of difficult-to-treat tumours.

US privately funded biopharma Visiox Pharmaceuticals has entered into a merger agreement with Ocuvex Therapeutics, a privately held US ophthalmic pharma focused on developing and commercialising novel therapies for glaucoma and other disorders. With its portfolio of ophthalmic medicines, the strategic combination aims to position the newly combined entity as an emerging leader in the eye care sector.

Swiss speciality chemical company Clariant and Austrian integrated oil, gas and petrochemical company OMV have formed a collaboration for the supply of ethylene and ethylene oxide derivatives with a lower carbon footprint. The move is in response to increasing consumer demand for more sustainable options, with a particular focus on European customers. Clariant and OMV will explore and develop new strategies to meet sustainability targets in the ethylene supply chain. As part of this cooperation, both companies will share their research findings, adopt a lifecycle assessment methodology for unified approaches and define detailed CO2-reduction roadmaps. This will include joint analysis of the collaboration potential for ethanol-to-ethylene technology.

Vivint Pharma, an Indian injectables pharmaceutical company, is planning to establish a state-of-the-art injectables manufacturing facility in Genome Valley, Hyderabad, India. The company will invest 4bn rupees ($48m) in the new facility, which will have the capacity to employ 1000 people.

German science and technology company Merck has signed an agreement to sell its global Surface Solutions business unit to Global New Material International Holdings, a China-based investment holding company.

Researchers from the Austrian Research Centre of Industrial Biotechnology (acib), German chemicals company BASF, and the University of Graz in Austria have co-developed a fundamentally new computer-assisted model that can improve enzyme performance and enable new biocatalytic production processes to be scaled up faster from the lab to industrial manufacturing. The researchers developed a regression model, a statistical method used to analyse and predict biochemical reactions based on collected scientific data. This approach makes it significantly easier to compute the optimal combination of reaction temperature and solvent concentration for the best-possible enzyme performance.

Charles River Laboratories International, a US pharma specialising in preclinical and clinical laboratory, gene therapy and cell therapy services for the pharmaceutical, medical device and biotech industries, and US drug discovery and development engine Autobahn Labs, a Samsara BioCapital-backed virtual accelerator for academic biotech, have formed a collaborative relationship. The agreement establishes Charles River as the preferred research partner to support Autobahn’s growing pipeline of early-stage, preclinical therapeutics’ programmes. This agreement will also grant Autobahn preferred access to Charles River’s drug discovery and development capabilities. The purpose of the partnership is to accelerate the advance of novel academic science into transformational new therapies across diverse therapeutic modalities and disease areas.

Pinetree Therapeutics, a US biotech developing next-generation targeted protein degraders (TPD) to combat drug resistance in oncology, has entered into an exclusive option and global license agreement with British-Swedish pharma and biotech AstraZeneca for a preclinical epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) degrader candidate. EGFR is found on the surface of some normal cells and is involved in cell growth, but it may also be found at high levels on some types of cancer cells, which causes these cells to grow and divide. AstraZeneca will be granted an exclusive option to license Pinetree’s preclinical EGFR degrader for global development and commercialisation. In exchange, Pinetree will receive upfront and near-term payments of up to $45m and is eligible to receive additional development and commercial milestone payments for a total deal value of over $500m, as well as tiered royalties on net sales worldwide.

China-based drug developer BeiGene, which specialises in drugs for cancer treatment, has opened its flagship US facility in Hopewell, New Jersey, at the Princeton West Innovation Campus. The facility houses biologics manufacturing capabilities and a clinical research and development centre that bolsters the company’s differentiated model as an oncology innovator. BeiGene has more than 30 molecules at clinical or commercial stage, and the 170,000m2 facility provides flexibility to scale production of its cancer medicines.

US instruments, software, services and consumables company Agilent Technologies has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Canadian CDMO BIOVECTRA for $925m. BIOVECTRA produces biologics, highly potent active pharmaceutical ingredients, and other molecules for targeted therapeutics. The acquisition builds on Agilent’s CDMO specialisation in oligonucleotides and CRISPR therapeutics.

US pharma and biotech Pfizer has announced the extension of the company’s highly automated API manufacturing facility in Tuas Biomedical Park, Singapore. The SGD$1bn (US$766m) facility extension spans 40,000m2 and will produce various small molecule APIs for Pfizer’s oncology, pain and antibiotic medicines.

The UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is supporting a partnership to enable the exchange of expertise and cutting-edge facilities between centres of research excellence in the UK and across Europe. The research will focus on catalysts, estimated to be involved in producing at least 80% of manufactured goods. Scientists from the UK’s Cardiff Catalysis Institute (CCI) and Cardiff University’s Max Planck Centre on the Fundamentals of Heterogeneous Catalysis (FUNCAT) will make and characterise new catalysts in collaboration with the Catalysis Hub in Harwell, UK; the Max Planck Institute für Kohlenforschung (KOFO) in Mulheim, Germany; the Fritz-Haber-Institute of the Max Planck Society (FHI) in Berlin, Germany; and the Instituto de Tecnologia Quimica (ITQ) in Valencia, Spain.

Elementis, a UK supplier of specialty chemicals for paint, coatings and industrial aqueous applications, has announced the expansion of its NiSAT (Non-Ionic Synthetic Associative Thickeners) technology production capacity to China. The new facility in Shanghai reflects the growing demand for sustainable and high-quality paints in China and the resulting need for NiSATs, which offer superior rheological characteristics compared with traditional hydrophobic thickening technologies.

German CDMO Rentschler Biopharma, whose products include advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs), has announced that its new production line in Milford, Massachusetts, US, is now fully operational. This facility, the largest investment in the company’s 150-year history, doubles Rentschler’s global cGMP capacity, and is focused mainly on commercial production of highly complex molecules. The new production line added 2000m2 of manufacturing cleanroom space and houses four new 2000L single-use bioreactors.

The European Commission has approved a €5bn German measure to support the European Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (ESMC) in the construction and operation of a microchip manufacturing plant in Dresden. ESMC is a joint venture between Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), German engineering and technology company Bosch, Germany’s largest semiconductor manufacturer Infineon, and Dutch semiconductor manufacturing and design company NXP. The measure aims to strengthen Europe’s security of supply, resilience and digital sovereignty in semiconductor technologies, in line with the objectives set out in the European Chips Act Communication and to help take the EU towards its goal of doubling chip production from 10% of the global market to 20%.

UK biopharma GSK has announced that its new global headquarters is now in central London. The site on the corner of New Oxford Street and Earnshaw Street offers close proximity to the UK capital’s fast-growing global life sciences hub, London’s Knowledge Quarter, and GSK’s existing collaboration partners including the Francis Crick Institute and King’s College London.