Ebola drug maker to buy US vaccine maker
28 Oct 2014 5:46 AM IST
The deal would see Fujifilm take a 49 percent stake in Kalon Biotherapeutics, with plans to buy the whole company ‘in the future’, the company said, without supplying financial details.
Japan’s leading Nikkei business daily said the acquisition would be worth several billion yen (tens of millions of dollars).
Kalon, established in 2011 by the State of Texas and Texas A&M University as a contract maker of biopharmaceutical products, can safely handle and produce vaccines against deadly pathogens, including anthrax, Fujifilm said, as it looks to further tap the health sector.
The firm’s shares jumped 2.88 percent to 3,691.0 yen in Tokyo on Monday.Fujifilm said last week it would increase its stock of Avigan, which has been given to several patients who were evacuated from Ebola-hit West Africa to Europe.The firm said it has enough Avigan tablets approved as an influenza drug in Japan to treat 20,000 people and enough of its active ingredient for 300,000 treatments.
Japan’s leading Nikkei business daily said the acquisition would be worth several billion yen (tens of millions of dollars).
Kalon, established in 2011 by the State of Texas and Texas A&M University as a contract maker of biopharmaceutical products, can safely handle and produce vaccines against deadly pathogens, including anthrax, Fujifilm said, as it looks to further tap the health sector.
The firm’s shares jumped 2.88 percent to 3,691.0 yen in Tokyo on Monday.Fujifilm said last week it would increase its stock of Avigan, which has been given to several patients who were evacuated from Ebola-hit West Africa to Europe.The firm said it has enough Avigan tablets approved as an influenza drug in Japan to treat 20,000 people and enough of its active ingredient for 300,000 treatments.
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