OPKO Health buys API developer

Miami, USA-based OPKO Health (NYSE: OPK), which is controlled by Israeli generics giant Teva Pharmaceutical Industries (Nasdaq: TEVA), has entered into an agreement to acquire FineTech Pharmaceutical, a profitable Israeli company which develops and produces high value, high potency active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), for a consideration of $27.5 million. The transaction is expected to close on December 29, 2011.

FineTech, established by current president and chief executive Arie Gutman, owns proprietary technology and know-how in several important areas of organic synthesis. The company offers a full range of services from paper chemistry and laboratory scale development to pilot scale and commercial production; it is staffed with a team of highly qualified chemists with vast experience in synthetic and analytical chemistry, as well as expertise in multi-step syntheses, new polymorph development, and chiral and prostaglandin chemistry. FineTech’s Food and Drug Administration-registered facility in Nesher, Israel, is equipped with state-of-the-art laboratory, production and quality control equipment. FineTech’s business model has been to develop complex and problematic APIs for sale or license to pharmaceutical companies in the USA, Canada, Europe and Israel.

”This acquisition is a good strategic fit for OPKO,” said Phillip Frost, OPKO’s chairman and chief executive, adding: “FineTech’s significant know-how and experience with analytical chemistry and organic syntheses, together with its production capabilities, will play a valuable role in the development of OPKO’s pipeline of proprietary peptoids and other molecules for diagnostic and therapeutic products, while providing revenues and profits."