Week of Mar. 5, 2012: BASi Restructures; Celerion, Ricerca Biosciences Form Biosimilars Alliance; and More

The CRO Bioanalytical Systems (BASi) plans to restructure its bioanalytical laboratory operations, a move that BASi expects will reduce operating costs by more than $2 million annually. BASi said that it plans to consolidate its laboratory in McMinnville, Oregon, into its 117,000-ft² headquarters facility in West Lafayette, Indiana. Additionally, the company is evaluating actions to improve the financial performance of its laboratory in Warwickshire, United Kingdom. Read More

Catalent Pharma Solutions has completed the acquisition, from Gelita, of the remaining 49% minority interest in the R.P. Scherer Eberbach business. After 60 years of joint partnership, Catalent and Gelita agreed that the R.P. Scherer Eberbach business will be better able to serve the growing European pharmaceutical and consumer health softgel market with R.P. Scherer fully integrated into Catalent. Read More

Celerion, a provider of early-stage drug-development services, and Ricerca Biosciences, a drug-safety assessment expert in harnessing external preclinical innovation, have formed of “The Biosimilars Alliance.” The Biosimilars Alliance is focused on preclinical and early clinical assessment of biologics manufactured by a new supplier. It will provide specialized services required to perform early assessment of the viability of a potential biosimilar product. These services include in vitro and in vivo pharmacological assessments of activity and toxicological and immunotoxicological studies. Read More

The Sanofi subsidiary Genzyme has begun shipping Fabrazyme (agalsidase beta), for treating Fabry’s disease, from its newly approved plant in Framingham, Massachusetts. As previously communicated, patients in the United States are now able to return to full dosing in March 2012. In addition, all new patients in the US are eligible to begin Fabrazyme treatment at full dosing levels. In Europe, the process of moving the most severely affected patients to full dose of Fabrazyme will begin in March 2012. Globally, the complete return to normal supply levels of Fabrazyme will begin in the second quarter and continue throughout the year as planned as Genzyme works to obtain all global regulatory approvals throughout the year and to build inventory. Read More

Industry Briefs:

A roundup of additional company and people news from pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical companies, their suppliers, and contract-service providers. Read More