Sartorius buys Cellca for process dev knowhow
The acquisition – terms of which were not made public – saw long time Cellca investors Kreissparkasse Biberach and KfW sell their stakes to SSB.
SSB said the purchase was motivated by Cellca’s process development business adding that it would further strengthen its offering following the acquisitions of BioOutsource and TAP Biosystems.
Laupheim, Germany-based Cellca targets biopharmaceutical firms that lack capacity for in-house process development. The firm also provides cell line development services that are focused around the popular Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cell line.
Cellca describes both GE Healthcare Bio-Sciences and Rentschler Biotechnology as important industry partners.
Process development
SSB – which is due to hold its half-year update conference later this month – markets itself as ‘total solutions provider’ to the biopharmaceutical manufacturing sector.
Commenting on the Cellca acquisition, Reinhard Vogt, a member of the SSB Executive Committee for Marketing and Sales, said: “Together with our single-use products, media and testing services, we are creating an attractive package, above all for young biopharmaceutical companies that need robust processes for the manufacture of their biologics."
The TAP takeover in 2013 added two small-volume, single-use bioreactor systems to SSB’s portfolio enabling it to offer biopharmaceutical industry customers the ability to conduct a large number of cell culture experiments in parallel.
BioOutsource, which was acquired by SSB in April, is a contract research organisation (CRO) that provides process development and analytical services.
