Business Concentrates SYNTHETIC BIOLOGY
▸ Merck and PolyOne target 3-D effects Merck KGaA and PolyOne are joining to develop smooth, molded plastics that ap-
Smooth caps appear 3-D with Merck technology. pear to have three-dimensional surfaces. The Merck technology, called in-mold 3-D, creates the effect with the help of pearlescent pigments. It can be implemented in a single step during the injection molding process, Merck says. PolyOne, a polymer service firm, sees applications in consumer product packaging and electronics.—MICHAEL MCCOY
INSTRUMENTATION
▸ Phenomenex to join Danaher portfolio
Zymergen gets $130 million for microbes Zymergen, a San Francisco Bay Area start-up, has raised $130 million in a second round of venture funding to build out its robotics- and computer-driven microbe engineering platform. The round was led by Japan’s SoftBank and included information technology investors such as Data Collective, True Ventures, and Innovation Endeavors, which is backed by Google Chairman Eric Schmidt. Zymergen was founded in 2013 to develop technology to predictably and quickly engineer microbes to produce new molecules. It has developed robots that build and test thousands of strains at a time and computational models to analyze them. The company says it is working with unnamed Fortune 500 companies on microbes with applications in chemicals, materials, agriculture, and health care. SoftBank Managing Director Deep Nishar has joined the company’s board, as has former Department of Energy secretary Steven Chu. Zymergen says it will use the funding to accelerate growth, support customers, and expand its workforce. Its website lists openings for 47 jobs.—MELODY BOMGARDNER
Securities has agreed to buy Chromaflo Technologies from Arsenal Capital Partners and Nordic Capital. Chromaflo makes colorants and pigment dispersions for coatings and composites.—MARC REISCH
FINANCE Danaher will acquire Phenomenex, a maker of chromatography columns with about 700 employees. The acquisition is intended to strengthen the instrumentation and consumables portfolio of the industrial conglomerate. Financial details were not disclosed, but Goldman Sachs estimates that Phenomenex has annual sales of about $200 million. Danaher says Phenomenex will continue to operate as a stand-alone company once the deal closes later this year. Other Danaher-owned instrument firms include Sciex, Beckman Coulter Life Sciences, and Molecular Devices.—MARC REISCH
INVESTMENT
▸ Two firms get new private owners Two chemical firms are being sold to new private equity buyers. Equistone Partners Europe has acquired a majority stake in United Initiators, a maker of organic peroxides and sulfates, from Vision Capital and Speyside Equity for an undisclosed sum. Speyside acquired United Initiators, which has annual sales of $260 million, from Evonik Industries in 2008. Separately, American
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▸ BASF sees lower sales and earnings
development services provider, and sister company Avrio Biopharmaceuticals, a contract manufacturer of injectable drugs. Both firms are located in Irvine, Calif. Avecia is a contract manufacturer of oligonucleotides with facilities in Massachusetts and Ohio. President Detlef Rethage says the purchase will broaden Avecia’s services for drug industry customers beyond oligonucleotide manufacturing.—MICHAEL MCCOY
MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS BASF gave investors a preview of its third-quarter sales and earnings, which, while down compared with last year, beat analysts’ expectations. The German giant had sales of $15.4 billion compared with $19.2 billion in the year-ago quarter and income from operations of $1.7 billion, down slightly from last year. The decreases were due mainly to BASF’s sale of its natural gas trading business in September 2015. Compared to the prior-year quarter, BASF says earnings from its performance products, functional materials, and agriculture businesses were considerably higher. BASF will release its full report on Oct. 27.—MELODY
▸ Indian firm buys Teva U.K. business
BOMGARDNER
FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
OUTSOURCING
DRUG SAFETY
▸ Avecia builds up drug service business
▸ Japanese firm prevents FDA access
Nitto Denko Avecia will acquire Irvine Pharmaceutical Services, an analytical
FDA issued a warning letter to Nippon Fine Chemical after the company pre-
India’s Intas Pharmaceuticals will pay $740 million to buy the U.K. and Ireland business of Actavis Generics from Teva Pharmaceutical Industries. The European Union said Teva had to divest the business to win approval for its 2015 acquisition of Actavis Generics from Allergan. Intas says the new business will double its sales in Europe to $500 million annually and make it a top-20 player in generics.—JEAN-
CREDIT: MERCK
POLYMERS
vented agency officials from entering the quality-control lab of its plant in Takasago, Japan. The incident occurred in December 2015 when, according to FDA, “the quality-control manager directed employees to stand shoulder-to-shoulder, barring our investigator from accessing portions of the laboratory and the equipment used to analyze drugs for U.S. distribution.” During the inspection, the company didn’t allow FDA to copy customer complaint letters describing shipments that contained foreign objects including glass, cardboard, metal, and a spider. FDA has banned the company’s products from the U.S.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
INVESTMENT
▸ Helsinn launches venture fund
▸ AstraZeneca buys second Amgen site AstraZeneca has bought a second biologics site in Colorado from Amgen. The Longmont facility, reported by local media outlets to have been acquired for $64.5 million, will be used to support operations at the Boulder site that the company bought from Amgen in September 2015. The purchase of the Boulder plant doubled AstraZeneca’s U.S. manufacturing capacity for biologics, which occupy a growing proportion of the company’s drug pipeline. AstraZeneca says it will add staff in Longmont as its pipeline matures.—LISA JARVIS
CREDIT: WACKER
▸ Anellotech has received a $1.5 million investment from a new, unidentified investor. Based in Pearl River, N.Y., Anellotech is developing aromatics from nonfood biomass with a goal of enabling biobased polystyrene and other aromatic plastics.
MATERIALS
▸ Wacker to research silicones in U.S. Wacker Chemie will set up a new R&D center in Ann Arbor, Mich., dedicated to supporting the firm’s silicones business in the Americas. The German company says it will invest a “single-digit million U.S. dollar fig-
▸ Four firms get Breakout Labs support Breakout Labs, an early-stage science investment fund created by billionaire Peter Thiel, is investing in four new companies. Azitra is tapping the skin microbiome to develop treatments for skin disorders; Opus 12, founded by three Stanford University students, has developed a reactor to transform carbon dioxide into chemicals and fuel; Seatrec is trying to eliminate our dependence on lithium batteries with its thermal recharging technology; and Zymo-
Business Roundup ▸ Ube Industries will more than double nylon 6 capacity at its plant in Castellón, Spain, to 70,000 metric tons per year. The Japanese firm says nylon film is being used as an environmentally friendly replacement for polyvinylidene chloride film in packaging applications.
Chem is engineering microbes to produce chemicals. Each company will get up to $350,000 over two years to support its research.—LISA JARVIS
START-UPS
The Swiss drug firm Helsinn has started a $50 million venture capital fund to invest in drug, device, and food start-ups. The fund will support firms with early-stage technologies for cancer therapeutics, diagnostics, and supportive care; metabolic and gastrointestinal disorders; and dermatology conditions. Helsinn will invest in 10 to 15 firms, providing scientific and clinical strategy guidance, along with operational and board support. So far, the fund has invested in firms including MEI Pharma, OncoResponse, and QuantuMDx.—ANN
THAYER
BIOLOGICS
▸ Kultevat, a St. Louis-based developer of dandelions that produce natural rubber, has expanded its R&D collaboration with Dutch crop innovation firm KeyGene. The two companies will build on successes in molecular breeding and hybrids, expand plantings of dandelions, and improve rubber extraction technology. ▸ Arkema will spend $15 million to build a polyester powder coating resins facility and laboratory in Navi Mumbai, India. The company already produces alkyd, acrylic, and polyester resins at the site.
ure,” mainly for equipWacker’s ment and installation new labs will of the labs. Located complement its in Michigan Innovatechnical center tion Headquarters, a in Adrian, Mich. coworking space with other high-tech operations, the R&D center will benefit from a business incubator atmosphere, Wacker says.—MICHAEL MCCOY
▸ Medivir will cut about 25 early-stage research and five administrative jobs as it focuses on oncology. It will seek partners for its infectious disease candidates and for MIV-711, which is in Phase II studies for treating osteoarthritis. The Swedish firm’s technology centers on protease inhibition and nucleotide/nucleoside science. ▸ Crescendo Biologics will work with Takeda Pharmaceutical to develop cancer therapies based on its Humabody human antibody fragments. Takeda will pay up to $36 million in upfront fees. Crescendo could receive up to $754 million more in milestone payments.
▸ Teva Pharmaceutical Industries will help commercialize, in the U.S. and Canada, biosimilar versions of the antibody drugs Rituxan and Herceptin being developed by South Korea’s Celltrion. Teva will pay Celltrion $160 million and share profits if the drugs are approved. ▸ Immunome, a biotech developing cancer immunotherapies, has raised $12.2 million in its first major round of funding. Immunome will use the money to develop its drug discovery engine, which is based on libraries of antibodies that bind to cancer neoantigens.
OCTOBER 17, 2016 | CEN.ACS.ORG | C&EN
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