Deal helps Avacta to extend into Indian market

DIAGNOSTICS specialist Avacta Group is targeting the Indian drug development market after striking a third deal with global filtration company Pall Corporation.

The Wetherby-based company’s latest agreement with Pall follows deals to target North America and South East Asia.

Avacta picked Pall as the sole distributor for Optim in India.

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Optim is designed to speed up and reduce the cost of drug development. Avacta claims it delivers vital information ten times faster than other approaches using much smaller samples.

The high-tech devices sell for around £92,500, with Avacta earning £55,000 of this and distributors taking the rest.

Avacta chief executive Alastair Smith said: “I am delighted to announce that we have successfully signed another exclusive agreement with Pall. Pall have proven to be an excellent partner for Avacta and the success of our existing collaborations with Pall in North America and South East Asia have been a major factor in our decision to choose Pall as the sole distributor for Optim in India.

“We are very excited by the opportunities available in India and are now looking forward to working with Pall in this new territory.”

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Ken Frank, senior vice president of Pall Corporation and president of Pall’s biopharmaceutical division, said: “This extension of our collaboration with Avacta in India complements our ForteBio technology and other initiatives, while adding to Pall’s capability to provide high value, differentiated solutions to the developers and manufacturers of biomolecules for global healthcare needs.”

Pall also has exclusive marketing and distribution rights to Optim in a number of countries across the Pacific Rim, including South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.

Avacta said India’s biopharma industry saw three-fold growth in the five years leading up to 2010.

Avacta also has a distribution deal with DKSH Japan to distribute Optim in Japan. The country is the second largest biotechnology market after the US with over 500 bioventures, and is expected to grow ten times in volume by 2017.

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The company, spun out of the University of Leeds in 2004, last month said its results for the year to the end of July will meet expectations.

It sold 21 Optim units in its latest financial year, compared with 14 the year before.

Last year the company raised about £5m through a share placing. Avacta spent £1.5m of the placing proceeds on buying Leeds-based Aptuscan, which has developed unique binding agents for the diagnosis and treatment of disease.

Avacta has backed calls for a dedicated medical park in Leeds. It moved from York to Thorp Arch business park in Wetherby last year.

It floated on the Alternative Investment Market in 2006.

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