Charles River Laboratories is boosting its own early-stage contract research organization offerings by snapping up smaller rival firm Retrogenix.
The U.K.-based CRO is being bought out for £35 million ($48 million), with a $7 billion biobucks bonus also on the table.
Retrogenix offers cell microarray services for target receptor identification, off-target profiling, and target deconvolution for a wide range of drugs including biologics, cell therapies and small molecules.
The buyout boosts Charles River’s large-molecule and cell therapy discovery capabilities as well as a new platform for off-target screening for preclinical safety assurance in CAR-T cell therapies. Retrogenix will now be subsumed into Charles River’s discovery and safety assessment unit.
RELATED: Charles River Laboratories spends $83M to snap up Distributed Bio to boost antibody work
“The acquisition of Retrogenix strategically expands Charles River’s existing discovery capabilities by adding a proprietary cell microarray technology to accelerate target identification and provide preclinical safety assurance for novel therapies,” said James Foster, chairman, president and chief of Charles River.
“In addition to enhancing our position as the premier, single-source provider for a broad portfolio of discovery services, Retrogenix enhances our ability to support clients’ early-stage drug research efforts in advanced drug modalities, including cell therapies.
“Retrogenix’s goal is to become the industry standard for receptor identification and off-target screening solutions for biotherapeutics and cell therapies, and we believe the combination with Charles River’s extensive early-stage expertise will enable them to achieve this goal. We are pleased to welcome Retrogenix and its talented staff to the Charles River family.”
This comes after a series of boosts to its cell and gene therapy offerings, including a $875 million deal to snap up Cognate BioServices in February in a pact designed to create a one-stop-shop in cell and gene therapies.
At the start of the year, it also spent $83 million to buy out next-gen antibody discovery company Distributed Bio. The CRO got its hands on its so-called SuperHuman antibody libraries and integrated antibody optimization tech, which are designed to help support antibody and cell and gene therapy candidates for biopharma.
The Distributed Bio merger, alongside this week’s Retrogenix buyout, are part of that complementary M&A strategy.