Contract research news in brief
pharmafile | September 29, 2010 | News story | Research and Development |Â Â CIT, Cardialysis, PPD, Parexel, Porsolt, SticaresÂ
A round-up of recent news from the CRO sector, featuring updates from CIT, Parexel, PPD, Cardialysis/Sticares and Porsolt.
French non-clinical contract research organisation (CRO) CIT has set up a US subsidiary to expand its business on the other side of the Atlantic. The new company, called CITox and based in Boston, is expected to boost US sales from the current level of 15% to 30% or more within three to five years. CIT also said it had appointed Bernard Galat as vice president of business development for the North American region to help drive the expansion. Galat joins the firm after stints at Xceleron and Parexel.
Drugmaker Eli Lilly has forged a high-level supplier agreement with Parexel to help support clinical programmes in the Asia-Pacific region. The CRO will help Lilly start up studies and provide site monitoring services, helping Lilly to focus on its relationships with clinical investigators and regulatory authorities and speed drugs to market.
Meanwhile, there was further good news for Parexel with the announcement that it would provide strategic level services to GlaxoSmithKline along with PPD, another top-tier CRO. GSK has said it intends to work with fewer CROs overall but at a much higher level and over longer contract terms, in order to get the most out of the money it spends on outsourced services. Specific details of the contracts have yet to be divulged.
Two Dutch CROs – Cardialysis and Sticares InterACT – have forged a strategic alliance offering phase II-IV services in the areas of cardiovascular and metabolic medicine. Cardialysis brings expertise in lab techniques and clinical trial management services to the collaboration, with Sticares offering clinical project management, site management, medical monitoring and pharmacovigilance capabilities. The latter company also has a strong presence in Eastern Europe.
Porsolt has opened a new research centre in San Antonio, USA, that will provide specialist pharmacology services to the pharmaceutical and biotech industry. The French CRO, which specialises in preclinical research, said that services offered at the new unit will focus on abuse-liability assessment of new drug candidates in non-human primates. The facility is Porsolt’s first outside France.
Phil Taylor
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