Telix Pharmaceuticals acquires Belgium-based Advanced Nuclear Medicine Ingredients
Following the takeover, Telix Pharmaceuticals and Advanced Nuclear Medicine Ingredients will work together on commercialising multiple products.
Telix Pharmaceuticals (ASX: TLX) has made a play for Belgium company Advanced Nuclear Medicine Ingredients, with the takeover valuing ANMI at over £5.15 million ($8.07 million).
Under the acquisition terms, Telix will issue €3.15 million ($5 million) shares at $0.83 each.
In addition to the Telix shares, the company will also pay €2 million cash and assume non-recourse debt of €800,000 through low-interest commercial development loans.
Telix is developing diagnostic and therapeutic drugs based on molecularly-targeted radiation and has offices in Japan, the US and EU.
The company has generated a clinical-stage oncology product portfolio to treat renal, prostate and brain cancer.
In comparison, ANMI develops radiopharmaceutical solutions and is a global service provider in the nuclear medicine field.
ANMI’s strategy is to increase patient access to highly specific theranotsic radiopharmaceuticals through streamlined and cost-effective manufacturing.
According to Telix, it needed a “companion diagnostic” for its prostate therapy program and after “extensive” evaluation it selected 68Ga-PSMA as its companion diagnostic and the opportunities it affords in the US market.
Telix then chose ANMI to work as its technology partner.
“We have been building a relationship with ANMI over the past two years,” Telix chief executive officer Dr Christian Behrenbruch said.
“Our respective organisations already work very closely together, and this transaction is the logical progression that creates a significantly more capable company with the ability to act strategically on a global basis, rather than in a territorially-segmented manner,” Dr Behrenbruch explained.
Meanwhile, ANMI co-founder and chief execute officer Ludovic Wouters said both companies had already achieved “a great deal” as current business partners.
“With the growing importance of the role of nuclear medicine, particularly in prostate cancer care, our respective companies can benefit from establishing a more integrated approach to combining our diagnostic and therapeutic strengths,” Mr Wouters added.
ANMI to operate as a subsidiary of Telix and will assist Telix’s product development by packaging its therapeutic products in a form that is fast and easy to prepare in a radiopharmacy setting.
According to Telix, the takeover will give it access to “rapidly growing demand” for prostate imaging outside of the US for the 68Ga-PSMA kit.
Telix claims PSMA is a “highly promising” cancer target for a range of diagnostic and therapeutic strategies in prostate cancer.
The HBED-CC-PSMA-11 is a small molecule that targets and binds to PSMA enabling imaging of metastatic prostate cancer using positron emission tomography.
As a result, the 68Ga-PSMA kit has been created and is in late-stage clinical development in Europe and is partnered in the US under the illumet brand.
“By aligning the US and Europe activities more closely, time and cost efficiencies are expected to result,” Telix stated.