Recipharm, a Swedish pharmaceutical contract development and manufacturing organisation, is to buy a manufacturing facility from Flamel Technologies in a deal worth €10.6m and has entered into a long-term collaboration with the Lyon, France-headquartered company.
Under the agreement, Recipharm will purchase Flamel’s development and manufacturing facility in Pessac and significantly expand its pharmaceutical development capacity and technical capabilities to provide easier access for development services to its French and other customers.
Recipharm will also provide development and manufacturing support to Flamel under a long-term services agreement.
The deal adds new technical capabilities for spray granulation and spray coating.
This new partnership allows Flamel to retain access to the development and manufacturing capabilities at Pessac and possibly use any of Recipharm’s other facilities for the development or manufacture of its proprietary pipeline. Recipharm will also assume development and manufacturing agreements with other companies and as well as an agreement providing a royalty income.
In a separate deal, Recipharm will invest €10.5m in newly issued Flamel Shares which corresponds to approximately 2.3% of Flamel shares.
Development services is in many respects a ‘local’ business so having another centre should allow us to increase this aspect of our business
Recipharm also has an option to negotiate with Flamel for the European rights to any product that the French company plans to license for sale in the European market.
The deal is expected to close before the end of the year.
Recipharm's Chief Executive Thomas Eldered said: 'I am delighted that we are now entering into a strategic partnership with Flamel and taking over a first class development and manufacturing facility in France. Development services is in many respects a ‘local’ business so having another centre in addition to Sweden should allow us to increase this aspect of our business.'
Mike Anderson, CEO of Flamel said Flamel’s primary objective is 'the development of products using its proprietary drug delivery platforms' and the sale of the Pessac facility 'frees the company from the time-consuming task of running a contract development manufacturing facility'.
He added: 'This sale allows us to continue development of our proprietary products using our current drug delivery technologies at the Pessac facility and the option to utilise Recipharm’s commercial manufacturing capabilities elsewhere. Given Recipharm’s expertise, the investment in Flamel’s stock is a welcome endorsement of the company's anticipated success moving forward.'