ENERGY
▸ Momentive buys silane supplier Momentive Performance Materials has purchased Sea Lion Technology, a Texas City, Texas, contract manufacturer that has been supplying Momentive with silanes, including its NXT brand silane, used in fuel-efficient tires. Last year, Momentive began work on a $30 million NXT silane capacity expansion in Leverkusen, Germany, a project the company expects to complete later this year. Momentive says the expansion and the Texas City plant purchase ensure security of supply for the product, which is in high demand.—ALEX TULLO
DRUG DEVELOPMENT
Lilly buys pain drug firm Eli Lilly & Co. will pay about $960 million to acquire CoLucid Pharmaceuticals, a publicly traded biotech firm that is developing lasmiditan, an oral 5-HT1F agonist for the treatment of migraine. Lasmiditan has completed the first of two Phase III clinical trials; data from one of them are exF pected later this year. If the data are positive, lasmiditan could be submitted for FDA approval in 2018. Lilly discovered lasmiditan and licensed it to CoLucid in 2005, at a time when Lilly was not F F focused on pain management. Now, the company is O NH developing a pain management drug pipeline CH3 that includes galcanezumab for migraine and N N tanezumab, being developed with Pfizer for multiple indications. Lilly CEO David A. Ricks says lasmiditan could be the “the first significant O innovation for the acute treatment of migraine in Lasmiditan more than 20 years.”—MICHAEL MCCOY
POLLUTION
▸ Innophos settles with EPA Innophos has settled with EPA and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality over waste treatment at its Geismar, La., phosphoric acid complex. EPA says Innophos sent hazardous waste from its purified phosphoric acid facility for disposal at a neighboring PotashCorp plant that supplies crude phosphoric acid. The waste contained arsenic, cadmium, and chromium. Innophos claims it has always complied with applicable laws but that it nevertheless has been making changes at the facility. For instance, last year, the company began work on a $16 million deep-well injection system. Innophos will also pay a $1.4 million civil penalty.—ALEX TULLO
POLYMERS
CREDIT: AIR LIQUIDE
▸ Eastman spins yarn for sports apparel Eastman Chemical is expanding production of Avra fibers made in collaboration with the yarn maker Unifi at the latter’s Yadkinville, N.C., plant. Heralded by the partners as “the next generation of fiber technology” when it was introduced last August, Avra is made by extruding polyester polymers into fibers too thin to be woven or knitted on their own. Instead, they are held together by a removable polymer that is washed away after the fabric is made. Fabrics made with Avra are suited for the sports apparel market, Eastman says, because of
their silky feel and ability to wick moisture away from the skin.—MARC REISCH
INSTRUMENTATION
▸ X-ray scattering specialists combine
ing a new logo and embarking on what it says is a customer-centric strategy. With the acquisition, completed last year for more than $13 billion, Air Liquide now has 68,000 employees and serves more than 3 million customers and medical gas patients worldwide.—MICHAEL MCCOY
FOOD INGREDIENTS Xenocs, a French maker of instruments for nano-scale measurement, has acquired Saxlabs for an undisclosed amount of cash. Saxlabs is a small-angle X-ray scattering instrument specialist founded in 2004. Xenocs, founded in 2000 as a spin-off from Institute Laue-Langevin, makes instruments that use small and wide-angle X-ray scattering techniques. Saxlabs’ solid North American presence will help extend Xenocs geographically, says Xenocs Managing Director Frédéric Bossan.—MICHAEL MCCOY
SPECIALTY CHEMICALS
▸ Givaudan buys Activ for organic flavors The flavors and fragrances company Givaudan has acquired Activ International, a Swiss flavors maker that sells natural and organic flavors, including ones extracted from marine sources and vegetables. Activ has 170 employees and generated sales in 2016 of about $40 million. “Consumers around the world are increasingly demanding more natural and organic products from food and beverage companies,” says Mauricio Graber, president of Givaudan’s flavors division.—ALEX SCOTT
▸ Air Liquide rebrands after Airgas deal
START-UPS
After its acquisition of Airgas, the French industrial gas maker Air Liquide is launch-
▸ Evonik invests in oil additives firm
Air Liquide’s new logo is up at facilities worldwide.
Evonik Industries’ venture capital arm has invested an undisclosed sum in Nanotech Industrial Solutions, an Avenel, N.J.-based maker of additives for engine oils, metalworking fluids, and greases. Founded in 2012, NIS has developed nano-sized, JANUARY 23, 2017 | CEN.ACS.ORG | C&EN
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Business Concentrates
EMPLOYMENT
▸ Ophthotech and Nivalis slash jobs NIS’s labs in Avenel, N.J. fullerene-like tungsten disulfide particles that provide friction-reducing properties to lubricants. Evonik already supplies a line of polymeric additives to the lubricants industry.—MICHAEL MCCOY
RARE DISEASE
▸ Biotech firm Ovid develops Takeda drug In a reverse of the usual big pharma-biotech relationship, the New York City-based biotech firm Ovid Therapeutics will help develop a Takeda Pharmaceutical drug for rare pediatric epilepsy. The drug, a small molecule called TAK-935, inhibits the enzyme choles-
Poor clinical trial results have pushed two companies to each cut about 80% of their staff, including top executives, as they determine how to move ahead. In December, Ophthotech reported that its anti-PDGF therapy Fovista failed to show any benefit in two late-stage macular degeneration trials. At the time, the company had about 154 employees. Separately, Nivalis Therapeutics is restructuring and will retain just five of its 30 employees after a disappointing Phase II trial of its cystic fibrosis drug cavosonstat.—ANN THAYER
MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS
▸ Aurobindo to buy Portuguese firm India’s Aurobindo Pharma will pay $144 million to acquire the Portuguese firm Generis
Business Roundup ▸ Tosoh will spend $37 million to build a 110,000-metric-ton-per-year polyvinyl chloride plant in the Philippines. The facility will nearly double the company’s PVC capacity in the country, which is currently investing in its water distribution and sewage infrastructure. ▸ VWR, a laboratory products supplier, has acquired SeaStar Chemicals, a British Columbia-based maker of high-purity reagents. SeaStar uses proprietary purification technology and a customized bottling process to maintain high reagent purity levels, VWR says.
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Farmacêutica. Both companies produce generic drugs, but Aurobindo is also back-integrated into the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients. Aurobindo expects the purchase will make it the largest supplier of generic drugs in Portugal. It plans to use the output of Generis’s plant to supply Portugal as well as other countries in Europe. Currently owned by the private equity firm Magnum Capital Partners, Generis recorded sales of $70 million last year.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
OUTSOURCING
▸ China’s Pharmaron bags analysis firm Xceleron The Beijing-based contract research firm Pharmaron has agreed to buy Xceleron, a provider of mass spectrometry services based in Germantown, Md. According to Pharmaron, Xceleron has developed accelerator mass-spectrometry technology that uses carbon-14 ion counting to analyze very small drug samples. The Chinese firm expects the technology to complement its U.K.-based offerings in the area of radiolabeled compound manufacturing and radiolabeled metabolism services. Pharmaron was formed in 2003 and employs about 4,000 people.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS
TREMBLAY
▸ ExxonMobil and Synthetic Genomics are extending a 2009 agreement to make biofuels from algae. The companies say they have made “significant progress” in understanding algae genetics and growth characteristics and in increasing oil production.
▸ Merck KGaA and software supplier Palantir Technologies are joining to implement a data integration and analysis regimen at the drug firm. The partnership will launch with initiatives at Merck’s headquarters targeting drug development, patient monitoring, and supply chain management.
▸ Regeneron Pharmaceuticals has told stock analysts that FDA has officially deemed Sanofi’s Le Trait, France, manufacturing facility to be acceptable. Problems at the plant had threatened the timing of regulatory review of the companies’ jointly developed monoclonal antibody drugs sarilumab and dupilumab.
▸ Merck KGaA has opened a plant in Mollet des Vallès, Spain, that makes meglumine, an FDA-approved drug excipient and a component of medical imaging contrast media. Meglumine interacts with active pharmaceutical ingredients to increase solubility. Merck calls the plant the only one of its kind in Europe.
▸ Takeda Pharmaceutical has licensed antibody-drug conjugate technology from the South Korean firm LegoChem. The technology, called ConjuAll, uses a site-specific bioconjugation method and a β-glucuronide linker to create homogeneous ADCs, LegoChem says.
▸ Evotec, MaRS Innovation, and Canadian researchers have launched Fibrocor Therapeutics to target fibrotic diseases. MaRS and others have invested about $2 million in the Toronto-based start-up, while Evotec is providing drug discovery activities in exchange for an equity stake.
C&EN | CEN.ACS.ORG | JANUARY 23, 2017
CREDIT: EVONIK
terol 24-hydroxylase, which may have a role in central nervous system diseases such as epilepsy. In the deal, Takeda received equity in Ovid, which specializes in rare neurological diseases. The two firms will share any profits on a 50-50 basis.—MICHAEL MCCOY
